Dear Decision-Makers and Leaders of Australia,

I am personally writing this from the perspective of a concerned Citizen, Medical Practitioner, Pharmacist, small business owner and Father of three young children, including one who is school aged.

As a topic of widespread interest, from discussions and information with my fellow medical and pharmacy colleagues, the impact of Covid-19 is accelerating at an exponential pace.

The news of our hard-hit colleagues in Italy and Europe has given us a chance to act immediately on the very precious extra time that we have to prevent following a similar trend and to learn from their experience. This will allow our health systems to better cope with the expected rise in cases, and save many lives in the process.

We would urge an acceleration immediately to Stage 2 and 3 of your relative Pandemic plans, for example - Targeted and Peak Action to contain the spread. There will be significant economic implications and we do recognise the difficulty of balancing the timing of such a decision.

The problem now is that we are very quickly running out of time.

To save lives we strongly recommend the following actions immediately to Flatten the Curve:

1. Highlight and Strongly Encourage Social Distancing

2. Accelerate to Phase 2/3 of Plans

3. Close and/or minimise Attendance at Public Gathering Places - i.e. Schools and Universities, Workplaces