COVID-19 patients in rural hospitals face an extended wait to be transferred to regional or metropolitan centres, according to the new president of the Rural Doctors Association of Australia.
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Dr Megan Belot works in country Victoria and was elected to the position last week.
She says COVID patients in several states needing treatment in bigger hospitals are being transported by air, with the shorter trip reducing the infection risk for paramedics.
But very sick patients are waiting 24-48 hours for a flight.
"At the best of times it takes time to get transfers. You really have to argue or beg for a bed for certain people and with COVID it's going to take a lot longer," Dr Belot told AAP.
In NSW, COVID has spread into the Byron Bay area, as well as the Hunter and state's west, while in Victoria, outbreaks have hit Shepparton, Mildura and the border region around Albury-Wodonga.
Ambulance Victoria maintains it's not seeing a significant increase in transfers from the regions to Melbourne.
It has four planes and five helicopters available but transport times vary depending on where and how sick patients are, hospital capacity and pressure on local ambulance crews.
"We have increased the capacity of our retrieval services to manage and plan for potential increases in rural demand as a result of impending population movement with the easing of restrictions," a spokeswoman said.
"We will add further resources if required."
A new transport service for patients not critically ill will begin helping people in country Victoria within days.
NSW Health says its numbers of its rural and regional COVID patients requiring transfer by air are very few.
However Dr Belot is also concerned small rural hospitals lack the negative air pressure rooms need to prevent the spread of COVID and wants to see ventilation hoods installed instead.
"They filter the air around the patient and have proven to be very effective at preventing infection ... but who funds them, who pays for them is uncertain," she said.
The Victorian Health department did not say how many of these facilities it has but insists all its hospitals do have the right equipment to deal with patients.
"We have the equipment we need, we have the PPE and every day we are opening more beds as we need across the state," a spokesperson told AAP.
The Queensland hospital system has more than 300 negative pressure rooms, an increase of about 20 per cent during the pandemic, about 200 of them beyond the Brisbane metro area.
South Australia operates 26 negative pressure rooms across its regional network and says 95 per cent of COVID cases receive home or hotel-based care.
In the Northern Territory, where it is standard practice to airlift patients, there are 36 negative pressure rooms and approximately 100 ventilators. Its National Critical Care and Trauma Response Centre also has resources that can be drawn upon if required.
Dr Belot also warned non-COVID patients needing treatment in a rural hospital will also face delays.
"The reality is our small rural hospitals are going to be pretty busy in the coming months," she said.
Rural and regional communities across Australia had achieved good vaccination rates, she said, but those in some indigenous communities in the north were lower.
"That is an extreme worry that is quite concerning because Indigenous people are at high risk of getting sick."
Just over 250,000 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders have been fully vaccinated.
Australian Associated Press
