Department of Health

And that really is Palliative Care Australia's, um, focus is to work with government to influence, um, those pieces.

Then at the state level, we've got the statewide palliative care strategy, and we've just had the latest implementation plan number two released, the wonderful work of the Department of Health here.

And our role is to work with, um, the West Australian health system to try to influence, um, uh, the policies and, and funding in those areas.

Wh- where that overlaps a little bit is in areas where there's great need in our community, and one of the advocacy pieces that Palliative Care WA has been working on at the moment is addressing a gap in, um, in support for people, uh, who are under 65 years of age who may not be eligible for the NDIS, uh, and aren't eligible for the aged care system, but still require those in-home supports to really help them die, uh, in their home or at, at their place of choosing.

Um, we've got a late substitute in, uh, but we, uh, did-- I think we're better off.

Tim Lane, uh, acting director and, uh, and, uh, at, uh, the Office for Medical Research and Innovation at WA Health.

We've got Claire Lake, chief nursing information officer from the Sydney Children's Hospital Network, which we'll explain in a second.

Uh, we've got Brad, the senior solutions architect at St. John of God Healthcare, and Vickie Knight, the general manager for clinical services at Roland Australia & New Zealand.

Today we have Dr. Paul Effler joining us to discuss H5N1 bird flu and pertussis.

Paul is a senior medical advisor in the Communicable Disease Control Directorate at the WA Department of Health and an adjunct clinical professor at the University of WA School of Medicine.

He trained as a physician at the University of California, San Diego, before working in the CDC's Epidemic Intelligence Service in Atlanta and later serving as state epidemiologist in Hawaii for around 15 years before relocating to WA.

His research and public health work spans influenza, pertussis, vaccine safety, and emerging communicable disease threats, making him a leading voice on outbreak response for clinicians.