A message from
your President
Welcome to this first edition of RACP Quarterly for 2021,
and it’s wonderful to begin on such a positive note.
Despite any temporary hiccups, we can all celebrate the historic milestone of coronavirus vaccinations finally beginning in this part of the world.
In a College media release supporting the rollout beginning in Australia I commented that this marks an incredible achievement in our battle against the global COVID-19 pandemic.
Australia is in this position thanks to the hard work of our frontline workers, state and federal governments, and the everyday Australians who have been doing the right thing and following the advice of health experts.
The vaccines being rolled out have gone through rigorous approval processes by the Therapeutic Goods Administration, which is one of the best regulators of its kind in the world.
Our endorsement was widely reported.
We received 147 media mentions across metropolitan and regional television, print and online channels across Australia, Aotearoa New Zealand and internationally, as well as 178 mentions on radio.
In the coming weeks and months, many of our members in both Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand will be vaccinated as priority healthcare workers in the first waves of those to be protected.
The pandemic’s momentous economic and social shocks and impact on healthcare will be felt for many years to come.
But at least at this point – we can start to see the beginning of the end of this event – an extraordinarily difficult 12 months for everyone in our two nations, and around the world.
On a smaller scale, I want to highlight a significant achievement.
As I write this, the RACP has successfully put all Adult Medicine and Paediatric candidates through our video and teleconference Clinical Examination long cases.
We have had zero cancellations for technical issues.
This is an incredible achievement by our hard-working staff and the many Fellows on our peak Education Committees.
The virtual examination process has been highly complex, with many possible potential points of failure that we had to overcome.
It’s involved pushing videoconferencing and other software to its limits.
We are now delivering short cases and are beginning to plan for the 2021 Divisional Clinical Examination.
But we should take pride in where we stand today.
Our Clinical Examination success is proof positive that our College can take on big, complex, high stakes projects that are dependent on information technology, and that we can succeed.
Regards,
Professor John Wilson AM
RACP President