Avian influenza (H5N1) has arrived on Australian shores, but the immediate risk to aged care residents is low. It’s been identified only in wild birds, with no evidence of infection in Australian poultry or human transmission.
With that being said, the arrival of H5N1 serves as a timely reminder that infectious diseases don’t need to directly affect residents before they affect aged care providers. They can influence public confidence, raise questions from families, require providers to refresh outbreak preparedness and, if the situation evolves, they inadvertently place pressure on staffing, supply chains and operations.
As Associate Professor Vinod RMT Balasubramaniam from Monash University Malaysia puts it, “H5N1 bird flu in Australia should be viewed with vigilance, not panic. The current detections remain in wild birds, with no evidence at this stage of infection in poultry.”
That balance between vigilance and panic may be one of the most enduring lessons the sector carries forward from COVID. For many residents, families and staff, the emotional legacy of the pandemic is still close to the surface.
Emotional safety and outbreak management
The first casualty of an emerging health threat is often certainty, not health. For older Australians, news of the latest infectious disease is rarely just another headline to scroll past.
In reality, it can evoke memories of lockdowns, visitor restrictions, isolation from loved ones and the fear that accompanied constantly changing public health advice. In these moments, preserving emotional safety becomes just as important as protecting physical health.
That’s why communication needs to be viewed as a clinical intervention, not simply an operational task.
In aged care, communication rarely happens through press conferences or policy statements. It happens over a cup of tea, during a medication round or while helping someone to lunch. Those everyday conversations are where reassurance is built, uncertainty is eased and trust is either strengthened or lost.
The practiced reality of aged care biosecurity preparedness
The sector invests significant – needed – effort in maintaining outbreak management plans, infection prevention and control (IPC) protocols, PPE supplies and workforce contingencies. Those foundations remain essential.
But the Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission’s review of COVID outbreaks found that organisations managing outbreaks most effectively didn’t just have robust plans: they had practised them. Roles were clearly defined, communication pathways rehearsed and outbreak responses stress tested long before they were needed.
Some providers even simulated phone calls from anxious family members and media enquiries to test whether information reached the right people quickly, consistently and compassionately. It’s a great indicator that communication plans deserve the same rehearsal as clinical protocols.
Because residents experience health crises and outbreak events through a series of conversations.
They notice the rushed, clipped tone of a personal care worker explaining why routines have changed. They hear uncertainty in a facility manager’s voice. Families judge confidence by the clarity of an email or phone call. Trust is built, or eroded, one touchpoint at a time.
Getting it right: avian flu communication strategies in residential aged care
The challenge for leaders is that communication during a health event isn’t about saying more. COVID also taught us that information overload can create anxiety just as readily as information gaps.
Effective communication answers the questions people are already asking themselves:
- Am I safe?
- What does this mean for me?
- What happens next?
- When will I hear from you again?
Different audiences also need different conversations. Residents seek reassurance. Families need transparency and timely updates. Staff need practical direction and confidence in the organisation’s response. Delivering the same message to everyone risks meeting no one’s needs particularly well.
Internal vs external outbreak management
It’s also worth acknowledging that outbreak management isn’t new to aged care. Every year, providers navigate influenza, RSV, the long tail of COVID-19 and norovirus, balancing isolation precautions with quality of life and maintaining continuity of care for some of Australia’s most vulnerable people. These are well-rehearsed operational challenges, supported by established clinical pathways and experienced teams.
Emerging threats like avian influenza are different.
They arrive from outside the organisation, often with more questions than answers. There may be no resident cases to manage, but there are still anxious families, concerned staff and an evolving evidence base to interpret. It’s easy to overlook these external risks because they don’t immediately trigger the familiar outbreak response.
Yet this is precisely when leadership communication matters most.
Before the clinical response begins, organisations have an opportunity to build confidence through calm, transparent and proportionate communication.
Legacy and learnings of COVID into the future
Five years on from the pandemic, the outbreak management muscle memory inevitably fades as experienced staff leave, new employees join the workforce and emergency procedures become less familiar. IPC training, communication pathways and escalation processes all require regular refreshers if they are to remain effective. Stress testing outbreak plans should involve more than checking PPE inventories.
It should also test whether leaders know who speaks to residents, who contacts families, how frontline concerns reach executives and whether agency staff understand their role in the response.
Avian influenza may never become a significant operational challenge for aged care. But it is timely to revisit the capabilities that matter most when the next health crisis inevitably arrives.
Preparedness isn’t just about having the right protocols on the shelf. It’s about ensuring people know how to use them, and how to communicate with compassion, clarity and confidence when others are looking to them for reassurance.
Because in aged care, protecting emotional wellbeing isn’t separate from quality care, it’s integral to it.
