“They are so incredibly under-resourced,” she said.
In the past fortnight, a surge of influenza A cases has rapidly overloaded the health system, sparking widespread concerns after a relatively mild start to winter.
Covid health measures have been reinstated in GP clinics with phone-first triaging and respiratory patients being separated from normal patients.
Royal New Zealand College of General Practitioners president Dr Luke Bradford said not all winter illnesses being seen were influenza A, and that people were also suffering from other respiratory tract infections.
“This one is later than usual and is more impactful than we’ve seen for the last few years but doesn’t show a particular systemic issue in the health system. The key with the winter virus season is to try to stop people from spreading it and protecting the vulnerable,” he said.
A Middlemore nurse, who the Herald agreed not to name, said the hospital was receiving so many influenza patients staff were placing more beds than usual in corridors, and an emergency trolley of oxygen was available to those patients waiting for a bed.
The severity of the sickness didn’t seem markedly different from previous winters, she said, but it was worse for nurses because there were more patients and less capacity.
An Auckland Hospital doctor recently spoke out about near-constant overcrowding in the emergency department leaving staff demoralised and putting patients at risk.
Auckland Hospital emergency physician Dr Mike Nicholls told RNZ the emergency department was the canary in the coalmine.
“The emergency department is part of a complex healthcare system and it’s a useful way of looking at the healthcare system in total, because often when things aren’t going well in other parts of the healthcare system, we see that in the emergency department,” he said.
“Overcrowding in emergency departments is associated with increased harm for patients, including increased death. An escalation pathway is there to get everyone on the same page that we’re in a really risky situation.”
In response to questions from the Herald, Health NZ referred to previous communication from Chief Executive Dr Dale Bramley encouraging the public to explore alternative options to hospital – unless they were experiencing an emergency.
“We are here when people need us and we have also invested in many other ways of supporting people to get the right care they need,” Dr Bramley said.
Community pharmacies, Healthline and Online GP services would allow emergency department teams around the country to focus on those who most needed care, he said.
Papatoetoe Family Doctors’ Dr Karl Cole said he had seen 22 patients in just four hours one morning, with about half being flu-related. Typically, he would see about 12 patients in that same timeframe.
His practice was prepared for the winter spike, he said, and was accustomed to fitting people in who would otherwise have been sent to the emergency department. A high proportion of same-day appointments were kept free to accommodate these patients, but it was impossible to maintain this long term.
“You can only do it so long before you burn out,” he said.
Cole said the issue was that patients who needed to see their doctor for continuity of care couldn’t get access because the practice had to pivot its operating model to handle the surge in cases.
In April, the Government announced community pharmacies would be able to directly prescribe some common funded medicines for children and increased the number of clinical services they could provide.
Bramley said this helped people access care closer to home, “freeing up capacity across the wider health system”. He said online GP services were also seeing a strong uptake.
Earlier this year, the Weekend Herald reported GPs were divided on the continuing push towards online care as it raised concerns for patients being able to have regular consultations by a trusted doctor and receiving adequate physical examinations.
Cole said having prior knowledge of a patient when assessing flu symptoms was extremely helpful as it could help a doctor pick up on small things like their demeanour – whether they were typically laughing or joking – and subtle signs that they may be severely unwell.
There are complications associated with influenza that often cause hospitalisations. What starts as a bad flu for some patients can spiral into severe illness, such as pneumonia, which is more common in vulnerable and elderly patients.
Bradford said the cost of healthcare was always an issue, and may cause patients to delay seeking help from their GP.
These patients were more likely to end up in emergency departments which increased pressure on hospitals.
Within the practice population of Papatoetoe Family Doctors, 80% of patients fell into the lowest 20% bracket of national income, Cole said.
As a Very Low-Cost Access practice, appointments were free for patients under 14, but Cole had noticed parents were asking for prescriptions of Panadol because it was cheaper than buying it in the supermarket and this highlighted the cost pressures families were facing.
Schools have been asking parents to keep their unwell children at home but cost-of-living pressures meant parents were struggling to afford the time off work to look after them.
This month, St John Ambulance Service reported its highest volume of 111 calls on record, with 2562 calls coming through to the ambulance in a single day. A normal day would see around 1900 calls.
Parnell Family Doctors Dr Hilmer Budelmann said emergency departments had been “totally overloaded” by influenza cases, and the flu was spreading through the community with an increase in sickness being reported in schools.
Budelmann regularly tested patients with flu-like symptoms and many showed positive for influenza A, despite being vaccinated.
“My feeling is the strain we have at present has mutated and isn’t captured by the influenza vaccine,” Budelmann said.
However, Bradford said he believed the influenza A circulating was a reasonable match to the vaccine, which offered good protection, and that the best strategy for prevention was through vaccination and infection control measures.
“Our vaccination rates amongst those eligible aren’t high enough and only a proportion of the population are eligible for funded vaccine,” he said.
This week, two health unions called for the Ministry of Health and Pharmac to further organise fast-track approval, funding and distribution of vaccines which protected against respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) to ease pressure on hospitals.
Budelmann said there were also supply-chain distribution issues with the anti-viral medication Tamiflu, which could help patients early on when diagnosed with influenza.
Health NZ’s 2026 Winter Plan invested $25m in additional full-time equivalent staff and 103 additional hospital beds with a further 163 flex beds available, as well as hundreds of additional aged residential care placements across the country.
Health NZ executive national director – clinical Dr Richard Sullivan said there were many options for people needing healthcare.
Patient Kit Slade’s experience at Wellington’s emergency department has stuck with her.
It concerned her that those people in the waiting room could face further complications, become more unwell or potentially have to undergo secondary procedures because of the long wait for treatment.
The overcrowded conditions meant patients in the waiting room weren’t given the privacy and dignity they might have on a normal night, she said.
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