In the event of a coronavirus outbreak, LiveBetter Orange has a contingency plan to continue to provide accommodation to disability residents.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
LiveBetter chief executive officer Natalie Forsyth-Stock said the support workers are doing the best they can to minimise the spread.
"We have 25 supported independent living homes with 85 residents," she said.
"Staff are temperature checked, surgical mask are worn and they have to provide a declaration of how they are feeling and where they have visited.
"We are concerned about the hotspots spreading and the number of visitors that come up to Orange."
Ms Forsyth-Stock said in the event a client has coronavirus, the organisation has a "clean house", which is an empty accommodation, to continue providing care.
"We haven't had a case of coronavirus and the residents haven't shown any flu like symptoms," she said.
"In the event someone does fall ill, we have an empty space to undertake a quarantine process with selected disability support workers to keep up with their care.
"Even if the resident doesn't have the coronavirus, we will be treating them as if they were positive."
According to Ms Forsyth-Stock, staff members are working with a range of disabilities and they can be very susceptible if an outbreak occurred.
"Some of our residents have mild to severe disabilities, some are verbal and non-verbal," she said.
"It has been hard for staff to maintain social distancing with people who have an intellectual disability or are non-verbal because they don't understand social distancing.
"We do have some residents who are traumatised with staff wearing face masks and we are desensitising them by having a photo of the support worker without a mask so they recognise them."
Ms Forsyth-Stock added since the launch of the Carer Gateway support service in April, there hasn't been a lot of people in Orange utlitising the service.
"I think people who live in regional and rural communities think of themselves as self sufficient and that they will deal with any problems by themselves," she said.
"But during COVID, it's always good to know you can connect with a human being and get the help you need."
The service supports carers to receive support planning, counselling, carer directed support packages and emergency respite.
DO YOU WANT MORE ORANGE NEWS?
- Receive our free newsletters delivered to your inbox, as well as breaking news alerts. Sign up below ...