Here are a few I have come across the last week or so. Note: Each link is followed by a title and a few paragraphs. For the full article click on the link above title of the article. Note also that full access to some links may require site registration or subscription payment.
General Comment
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An interesting week as the Government started to try and get the Telehealth frenzy under control and manage the profiteers.
Also interesting that Optus is offering 5G wireless as an alternative to the a fixed NBN connection.
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https://croakey.org/telehealth-and-digital-health-navigators-a-bright-future-for-health-delivery/
Telehealth and digital health navigators – a bright future for health delivery
Marie McInerneyon: July 09, 2020In: Coronavirus outbreak 2019-2020, digital technology, general practice, health workforce, Healthcare and health reform, primary health care, Public health and population health, rural and remote health
Introduction by Croakey: The long-awaited access to telehealth consultations in the coronavirus pandemic has been broadly embraced by patients and health care providers, though it is not without concerns.
In the UK, the “telemedicine revolution”, which has come much faster than the NHS Long Term Plan anticipated, has been critical to continuing healthcare provision during the crisis but it has come at a cost for many of experience “digital exclusion”, according to this recent article in the BMJ.
Amid other concerns, the Royal Australian College of General Practitioners (RACGP) last week called for an urgent overhaul to telehealth and telephone consultations to ensure patients “steer clear of corporate telehealth pop-ups which have proliferated” amid the Federal Government’s expansion of Medicare-subsidised telehealth and telephone consultations.
The RACGP had long supported expanded telehealth and telephone consultations, which have helped decrease the risk of spreading COVID-19 to patients and practice staff and made care more accessible for vulnerable patients, said President Dr Harry Nespolon.
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https://www.ausdoc.com.au/news/psr-announces-first-gp-telehealth-investigation
PSR announces first GP telehealth investigation
The watchdog was asked to examine the doctor's MBS claims by the Federal Health Department
9th July 2020
The Professional Services Review has announced its first investigation into a doctor suspected of abusing the emergency coronavirus telehealth items.
The Medicare watchdog began auditing the GP late last month following a referral from the Federal Department of Health.
There are few details of the allegations, but Australian Doctor has been told the probe will examine whether face-to-face consultations should have been offered to patients who were seen remotely.
PSR director Professor Julie Quinlivan said there would be concerns about any phone or video consult claimed on Medicare where a physical examination was needed.
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10 Jul 2020 2:18 PM AEST
RACGP welcomes changes to telehealth to ensure high-quality patient care
The Royal Australian College of General Practitioners (RACGP) has welcomed the Australian Government’s move to only allow patients to access subsidised telehealth and telephone consultations through their usual GP.
The Federal Government expanded Medicare-subsidised telehealth and telephone consultations to all Australians earlier this year in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, to slow the virus spreading and ensure access to care for patients.
Today the government announced restrictions to telehealth and telephone consultations to a patient’s usual GP, starting July 20, with exemptions for infants (under 12 months), people experiencing homelessness, and people in COVID-19 hot spots.
RACGP President Dr Harry Nespolon welcomed the reform as key to ensure the community receives the highest quality care.
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https://www.ausdoc.com.au/news/govt-unveils-restrictions-telehealth
Govt unveils restrictions on telehealth
The MBS items will be restricted to practices who have seen the patient face-to-face in the last 12 months
10th July 2020
MBS telehealth items will be restricted to GP practices with an existing relationship with the patient, starting 20 July, the Federal Government has announced.
The change – demanded by the RACGP and AMA to preserve continuity of care – will apply everywhere except Melbourne and the Mitchell Shire, the two areas in Victoria currently under stay-at-home orders.
The definition of a relationship will be having seen the same GP, or a GP at the same practice, face-to-face in the last 12 months before the telehealth consultation takes place.
The restrictions will apply to all the temporary GP telehealth items introduced in March under the government's COVID-19 measures.
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https://www1.racgp.org.au/newsgp/professional/government-restricts-telehealth-mbs-access-to-pati
Government restricts telehealth MBS access to a patient’s regular GP
10 Jul 2020
The RACGP has welcomed the Federal Government’s decision, which comes after months of strong college advocacy.
Patients
will now only be able to access telehealth services under the Medicare Benefits
Schedule (MBS) through their regular GP or a referred non-GP specialist.
RACGP President Dr Harry Nespolon welcomed the reform, which will ensure both
convenience and appropriate high-quality care for patients.
‘I am very pleased the Government has listened to the concerns of our GPs,’ he
told
newsGP.
‘When the RACGP pushed for telehealth to be funded under Medicare, our
intention was always that these services would strengthen the GP–patient
relationship – that is, with their regular GP, who can also offer face-to-face
consultations when needed – and to ensure continuity of care.’
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Telehealth accounting for 20% of all Medicare-funded doctor consultations
Australian Medical Association has said the pandemic has shown telehealth works.
By Chris Duckett | July 10, 2020 -- 03:43 GMT (13:43 AEST) | Topic: Coronavirus: Business and technology in a pandemic
After years of people stating that telehealth would be the future of medical care, the Australian Medical Association (AMA) said the coronavirus pandemic has shown it works in Australia, and that it must become a permanent feature of the health system.
Responding to the Senate Select Committee on COVID-19, the AMA said telehealth was now accounting for 20% of all doctor consultations funded by the Medicare Benefits Schedule.
"The AMA has said for many years that telehealth should become a feature of our health system, complementing face to face care," it said.
"We must now turn to the task of fully integrating telehealth into day-to-day medical practice while ensuring continuity of care for patients and that we follow best practice standards."
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https://www.zdnet.com/article/services-australia-among-those-found-breaching-privacy-laws/
Services Australia among those found breaching privacy laws
Complaint against the government department revealed it disclosed bank statements to someone the complainant took a Family Violence Order out on.
By Asha Barbaschow | July 10, 2020 -- 00:58 GMT (10:58 AEST) | Topic: Security
The Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC) has made available the outcomes of its latest privacy complaint investigations, including a determination made against Services Australia.
In the complaint against the CEO of Services Australia, Australian Information and Privacy Commissioner Angelene Falk found that the federal government department interfered with the complainant's privacy as defined in the Privacy Act 1988 by breaching one of the guiding privacy principles.
Specifically, the department disclosed the complainant's personal information in breach of privacy principle 11.
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https://www1.racgp.org.au/newsgp/clinical/fast-tracked-electronic-prescribing-enters-testing
Electronic prescribing enters testing phase ahead of rollout
Simple, fast and secure – that’s what GPs are hoping for as the new era of electronic prescribing nears.
fast-tracked electronic prescribing system has entered its testing phase ahead of a nationwide roll-out – and many GPs hope it will make life easier for them and their patients.
07 Jul 2020
‘On
6 May 2020, Australia transmitted its first electronic prescription in primary
care – end to end, from the doctor to the patient – using a digital token via
an encrypted digital exchange to be dispensed by the pharmacist, and then
claimed through Services Australia at the other end.
‘It was a great outcome.
‘There are real live electronic prescriptions taking place in Australia at the
moment.’
That is Andrew Matthews, director of the Medicines Safety Program at the
Australian Digital Health Agency (ADHA), who has worked on Australia’s
accelerated push to electronic prescribing.
That first electronic prescription took place between Anglesea Medical and
Anglesea Pharmacy in Victoria.
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https://www.ausdoc.com.au/news/practice-fined-16000-after-sending-hiv-diagnosis-wrong-email-address
Practice fined $16,000 after sending HIV diagnosis to wrong email address
Couple originally wanted $250,000 for the alleged distress caused
6th July 2020
A GP practice which sent an email revealing a patient and his husband had HIV to the wrong address has been ordered to pay $16,400 in damages.
The couple had taken part in a global study on HIV transmission and the Victorian practice, which specialises in sexual health, was emailing a consent form to take part in a follow-up study.
The form should have been sent to the email addresses of the patient and his husband.
The husband’s email address used his first name, the initial of his middle name, followed by his last name.
But the practice omitted the middle initial, sending the email to an unidentified, unrelated Gmail account.
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https://www.itnews.com.au/news/medicare-to-reuse-centrelinks-new-payments-calculator-550174
Medicare to reuse Centrelink's new payments calculator
By Justin Hendry on Jul 7, 2020 6:34PM
Pegasystems platform to be utilised across Services Australia.
The payments calculation engine currently being developed by Infosys to work out the eligibility of Centrelink recipients looks set to replace the country’s legacy Medicare payments system.
Government Services Minister Stuart Robert revealed the new entitlements calculation engine (ECE) would be reused across Services Australia during a National Press Club address on Tuesday.
It ends two years of uncertainty over the future of the legacy Medicare payments processing system that began when the government dumped its procurement of a cloud-based replacement.
The ageing platform – also known as the health and aged care payments system – is currently used to deliver Medicare, Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme, veterans and aged care payments.
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https://www.hinz.org.nz/news/515758/National-Contact-Tracing-Solution-expanded-to-support-border.htm
National Contact Tracing Solution expanded to support border
Sunday, 5 July 2020
eHealthNews.nz editor Rebecca McBeth
The National Contact Tracing Solution (NCTS) has been expanded to support the Covid-19 border process with National Health Index numbers now being matched or assigned to all new arrivals.
Deputy director-general data and digital Shayne Hunter says the solution being rolled out to managed isolation and quarantine facilities also captures facility and room registration, day 3 and day 12 test requirements, daily health checks and the day 14 final release decision.
The Ministry’s databases for storing information about people in isolation facilities came under scrutiny last month when director general of health Ashley Bloomfield was unable to say how many people had left managed isolation without receiving a Covid-19 test. This was despite it being policy for a negative test to be returned before they were allowed to leave.
Bloomfield revealed at a media stand-up that the problem was there had been two databases operating, one for people in managed isolation facilities and quarantine and the other for medical information such as test results.
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Telstra Health claims it is back after nearly flaming out in 2017
Published on July 7, 2020
In 2013 Telstra Health announced it was going to be the gorilla in the health IT sector, including the aged care sector. By 2017, after investing $200 million in 18 acquisitions, but little enthusiasm from customers, it was forced to pull back from the market.
Now, three years later and with COVID, Mary Foley – the ex-National Head Practice Leader for PwC and ex-lead of St Vincent’s and Mater Health Sydney – in the Telstra Health leadership role, they have found their niche.
They were ideally placed for telehealth and they have led the introduction of remote electronic scripts. At the beginning of May, FRED IT, a joint venture partner of Telstra Health, successfully delivered the first paperless script transaction between a GP and a pharmacy.
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Saturday, 04 July 2020 13:00
Third batch of Toll documents leaked online after Windows ransomware attack
Cyber criminals who attacked Australian logistics and transport provider Toll Group in May have now released a third batch of documents which they exfiltrated from the company's website during the attack.
Toll was attacked using the Nefilim ransomware that runs only on Windows systems.
Among the documents, released as one text file and one zipped file, are many files dealing with compliance requirements for other countries, financial documents, tax invoices and the like.
Toll announced on 5 May that it had been compromised by the ransomware. This was the second attack on Toll this year, with the first in February being through use of the Mailto ransomware.
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AllergyPal wins innovation challenge to support children with food allergies
by Freya Lucas
The Australian Digital Health Agency has announced five winners of the $50,000 Innovation Challenge championing digital health innovation to provide a healthier future for Australians through connected healthcare, including AllergyPal, a digital management platform for children with food allergy.
Developed by an MCRI-based team AllergyPal was designed to support families in managing their child’s food allergy.
AllergyPal provides ready access to a child’s allergy plan, interactive guidance on how to manage allergic reactions in an emergency and a way for parents to leave individualised instructions on their preferred approach to allergen avoidance.
The app also has a share function which allows parents to give other carers direct access to all of the features of AllergyPal when leaving their child with friends and family or in education and care settings.
Anyone caring for a child can then use AllergyPal to help recognise the signs of an allergic reaction and seek appropriate help.
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Project iRAD to expand in SW Sydney region
Tuesday, 07 July, 2020
South Western Sydney Primary Health Network’s (SWSPHN) iRAD (Integrated Real-time Active Data) interoperability project has successfully concluded its 12-month pilot phase. The innovative solution enables healthcare organisations to share patient-consented health records across the continuum of care.
The initiative — driven by Allscripts’ dbMotion Solution — demonstrated its practicality during the COVID-19 pandemic by activating COVID-19 Risk Notifications and Dashboards to enhance patient and staff safety.
iRAD went live with general practices last year and exchanges data in real time between primary care sites, healthcare organisations and hospitals. SWSPHN has recruited and extended the platform to additional general practices and the federally funded COVID-19 respiratory clinics, assisting clinicians to provide continuity of care as patients visit an array of health services.
Allscripts Australia and New Zealand Director of Business and Partnerships Dani Arousi said that healthcare organisations around the globe continue to prioritise staff safety during the COVID-19 pandemic and that iRAD contributed to the successful management of the pandemic.
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https://www.itnews.com.au/news/govcms-withstands-massive-covid-traffic-spikes-550324
GovCMS withstands massive COVID traffic spikes
By Justin Hendry on Jul 10, 2020 11:02AM
Health Department stands up to a 760 percent increase.
Government websites using the hosting and content management system GovCMS withstood record traffic during the height of COVID-19, as Australians scrambled to find reliable sources of information.
At the peak of the public health response, the open source Drupal-based platform, which government agencies are increasingly using for their web channels, handled as many as 100,000 pageviews each minute and up to 187,000 concurrent users at a time.
The most visited page was understandably the health.gov.au website, which experienced a 760 percent increase in traffic, and on one day - likely when the government ramped up its public health response in March - recorded six million visits.
Despite the huge spike in traffic, which heath.gov.au technical product owner Danni Marlow said was “typically … up to 20,000 concurrent users”, the GovCMS site managed to keep page load time under 2.7 seconds.
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Stimulating device now an option for chronic back pain
Nevro
Friday,
03 July, 2020
Medical professionals can now access a TGA-approved device to treat patients with chronic back pain, which affects 3.24 million Australians.
The Senza Omnia Spinal Cord Stimulation System from Nevro delivers treatment for chronic back pain using frequency technology to stimulate the spinal cord and is reported to be the only product of its kind that can deliver all frequencies, between two and 10,000 HZ.
The device offers a waveform pioneered by Omnia — the HF10 — which was found to reduce pain across two 24-month trials. In the SENZA-EU study, a multicentre back pain study conducted in Europe, the average opioid intake of the patients was decreased by nearly 70% and the percentage of patients not taking opioids by two years had tripled (from 14% to 42%).
Nevro Chief Commercial Officer Niamh Pellegrini said the product will be available to medical practitioners across Australia from 1 July, following successful launches in the United States and Europe.
“Omnia was developed as a result of extensive feedback from physicians to provide a versatile solution to help more patients with chronic pain,” Pellegrini said.
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Friday, 26 June 2020 11:49
Tasmania Health Services Delivers Real-Time Data with Qlik to Fight Coronavirus
By David Deacon
David Deacon is State Manager, Clinical Financial Analytics Unit (CFA) of the Tasmania Health Service (THS). David shares how THS has incorporated data into its strategy to battle the pandemic.
Tasmania Health Service in Australia has embraced the use of data and analytics to stay ahead of the curve and formulate its response to COVID-19. Over the past 18 months, the Health Service has been developing a suite of near real-time operational focus boards together with key stakeholders, which they were then able to build on when the outbreak occurred.
Meet SIMON
The Statewide Information Management Operation Node (SIMON) is a centralized informational portal built on Qlik that supports both transactional input and output functions. The portal is alert oriented and provides enough detail to inform effective clinical decision-making, which enhances safe patient flow throughout the hospital.
When the pandemic was declared in March 2020, the COVID-19 Focus Board was created using SIMON and deployed within days at Emergency Command Centers. The emergency dashboard, designed to monitor the status of patients across emergency departments in Tasmania’s four major hospitals, was the first application to launch. Later, other dashboards were created, including those concerning critical care, emergency surgery, ambulance movement, occupancy and admission rates.
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Tuesday, 23 June 2020 17:08
How Peninsula Health transitioned to secure remote working fast with TDL and Citrix
VENDOR NEWS: As businesses emerge from the COVID-19 lockdown, we’re starting to hear stories of organisations that thrived and those that struggled to adapt to a predominantly remote workforce. One example of a business that got it right is Peninsula Health, which covers a number of health facilities and hospitals in the Frankston and Mornington Peninsula areas of Victoria.
With 1,000 back-office staff that needed to transition to remote working urgently, Peninsula Health enlisted TDL and Citrix to help. With no real history of remote working at an organisational level, and a high need to maintain data security, Peninsula Health sought to balance the requirement to move fast with the need to get the right remote working solution in place.
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Monday July 6, 2020
SOCIAL ROBOTS - A NEW TOOL IN HEALTH CARE THAT MAY BE AS EFFECTIVE AS A HUMAN CLINICIAN
A Monash Researcher has found that small interactive robots are proving useful in helping people develop and implement healthy lifestyle plans, showing they can support weight loss and healthy habits
The research trial, led by Dr Nicole Robinson, placed 26 social robots with participants to deliver a multi-session behaviour change treatment program around diet and weight reduction.
The robots interact with users and guide them through their program by providing audible prompts.
Results found the robot-delivered program helped people to achieve more than 50 per cent snack episode reduction and 4.4kg average weight loss.
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https://www.itnews.com.au/news/sydney-unis-brain-and-mind-centre-scores-7m-for-ai-projects-550226
Sydney Uni's Brain and Mind Centre scores $7m for AI projects
By Matt Johnston on Jul 9, 2020 6:42AM
For neurological and mental health disorders.
Two multidisciplinary projects at the University of Sydney are set to share in over $7 million to develop technologies for mental health and neurological disorders using artificial intelligence.
The two projects from the university’s Brain and Mind Centre received the funding as part of the federal government’s Medical Research Future Fund.
A shade over $4 million will go towards a project led by professor of neurology Michael Barnett and the the Sydney Neuroimaging Analysis Centre (SNAC).
They will investigate how AI can be combined with medical imaging technologies to improve diagnoses, monitoring and treatment of diseases like multiple sclerosis (MS).
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https://itwire.com/reviews-sp-288/networking/optus-5g-home-internet-is-an-nbn-killer.html
Thursday, 09 July 2020 15:43
Optus 5G home Internet is an NBN killer
For a while now, there have been mutterings here and there that the NBN Co's vain attempts to raise its average revenue per user — which has the fancy acronym ARPU — will face a real challenge once 5G gets a foothold in the community and retail service providers decide to use it to challenge the government monopoly.
That day seems to have arrived. I've just been playing around with one of the very real challengers, one that would definitely give the good folk at NBN Co some sleepless nights. Singtel Optus has started selling a service it calls Optus 5G home Internet – and, believe me, it is a real NBN killer. I can judge because in a few months' time I would have been on the NBN for three painful years.
Optus' solution to the bandwidth problem — which the NBN has illustrated in black and white — is simplicity itself. A 5G Nokia modem, in pristine white and looking every bit Scandinavian, is the only thing that's needed, along with a connector, of course. (This is what is meant by plug-and-play - though with Microsoft, which invented the term, it was always plug and pray.)
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Thursday, 09 July 2020 11:00
TelSoc says sacking staff a ‘misstep’ by NBN Co
Australia’s telecoms industry association, the Telecommunications Society (TelSoc), has raised serious concerns over the planned sacking of hundreds of employees by NBN Co, describing the move as a “misstep” by the company.
TelSoc vice-president Laurie Patton said the “massive” staff cuts was exactly what NBN Co - the operators of the National Broadband Network - should not be doing, and called instead for the company to begin “the replacement of millions of inferior connections”.
“They need to retain staff to do this,” Patton said in a statement issued on Thursday.
As iTWire reported, as the COVID-19 pandemic surges again, NBN Co has announced it would be sacking 800 employees before the end of the year, telling its staff on Wednesday that numbers would fall from 6300 to 5500.
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https://www.itnews.com.au/news/nbn-co-to-cut-800-staff-by-end-of-2020-550223
NBN Co to cut 800 staff by end of 2020
By Ry Crozier on Jul 8, 2020 4:00PM
Unveils plans for post-build internal restructure.
NBN Co is set to cut around 800 staff by the end of the year as part of a broader post-rollout restructure of the company.
CEO Stephen Rue said that the company would slim down the size of its direct workforce from around 6300 employees to “around 5500 people by the end of this calendar year.”
“As we have approached the final stages of the initial build, we have talked about changing the size and shape of the organisation and we are now preparing for the next phase of the company’s evolution,” Rue said.
Rue said NBN Co had paused the majority of internal restructuring activities over the past six months, in part to stay resourced enough to meet “data and operational demands brought on by the COVID-19 crisis.”
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https://itwire.com/telecoms-and-nbn/nbn-co-turfs-out-800-staff-as-covid-19-surges-again.html
Thursday, 09 July 2020 05:22
NBN Co turfs out 800 staff as COVID-19 surges again
As the COVID-19 pandemic surges again, the company that is rolling out Australia's broadband network has announced it would be sacking 800 employees before the end of the year.
NBN Co told its staff on Wednesday that numbers would fall from 6300 to 5500.
Chief executive Stephen Rue said in an email sent to staff: "With the initial network build complete and as we embark on our customer-led transformation in earnest, I would like to announce a series of changes to our operating model and executive management structure, as we align ourselves for the future.
He also said in another statement: "As we have approached the final stages of the initial build, we have talked about changing the size and shape of the organisation and we are now preparing for the next phase of the company's evolution."
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NBN Co's final build push includes 25k premises that fell through the cracks
By Ry Crozier on Jul 8, 2020 1:25PM
Due to overlap in responsibilities with Telstra.
NBN Co has revealed 25,000 premises in smaller new housing developments remain unconnected to the NBN after June 30 due to an apparent mix-up in the implementation of government policy.
The network builder provided an update earlier this week on the status of 109,000 premises whose connections were deemed too complex to be completed as part of the main “volume” build.
Cryptically, NBN Co said the 109,000 included “an additional 25,000 premises in new development sites”, without elaborating.
iTnews can now reveal that these are premises that Telstra deployed telecommunications infrastructure for in its role as an infrastructure provider of last resort (or IPOLR) under the government’s telecommunications in new developments (TIND) policy.
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Monday, 06 July 2020 11:51
NBN Co ‘proudly’ declares NBN construction targets achieved or ‘exceeded’
NBN Co says it has achieved or exceeded its National Broadband Network construction targets for 25 consecutive months by more than 230,000 premises, making 11.73 million premises ready to connect by 30 June this year.
The company building the network also touts the fact that in the last three months alone, it has made it possible for customers living and working in more than 500,000 premises throughout Australia to order an NBN service via their preferred service provider, exceeding its corporate plan 2020-23 and FY20 build target.
NBN Co said in a statement on Monday that during the three months to 30 June 2020, approximately 375,000 Australian homes and businesses have connected to the NBN, and the company “continues to activate around 30,000 additional premises every week”.
“More than 1.7 million additional premises have connected to the NBN in the last 12 months and by 30 June 2020, more than 7.26 million premises were connected to the NBN.”
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NBN Co will have 22,000 premises still awaiting infrastructure after this year
By Ry Crozier on Jul 6, 2020 11:32AM
Increases its focus on hard-to-connect sites.
NBN Co is now forecasting it will only have around 21,800 brownfields premises unable to connect to its network post-2020.
The company today provided more detail about the estimated 100,000 premises that it deemed too difficult to complete the build for by the end of June this year.
The number is now closer to 109,000, but NBN Co is now forecasting build completion for “approximately 80 percent of these premises” by the end of 2020.
The 109,000 comprises three tranches of work.
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Enjoy!
David.
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