6 August 2021

Coronavirus (COVID-19): Continuity of support obligations and outbreak preparedness

With the escalating COVID-19 situation, all providers are reminded of their obligations regarding continuity of critical supports. Outbreak management and business continuity plans should be reviewed.

Key points

• Providers are reminded of their obligations regarding continuity of critical supports. The withdrawal of critical supports and services to a participant, without consultation, may constitute a breach of the NDIS Code of Conduct or NDIS Practice Standards.
• Notify the NDIS Commission of any significant changes to services or supports as a result of COVID-19 restrictions or infections.
• NDIS providers should review their outbreak management and business continuity plans and take steps to prevent the risk of infection of NDIS participants and workers.
• Information and support to access COVID-19 vaccinations should be facilitated, to both NDIS participants and workers.

Provider obligations regarding continuity of critical supports

The COVID-19 pandemic does not change the obligations of NDIS providers, both registered and unregistered, under the NDIS Code of Conduct. These obligations are to protect and prevent people with disability from experiencing harm arising from poor quality or unsafe supports, abuse, neglect and exploitation, or poorly managed changes to supports.

As a registered NDIS provider, you also have obligations under the NDIS Practice Standards, as well as your conditions of registration, that relate to:

• the provision of supports and services to people with disability in a safe environment, and
• the management of risks associated with the supports you provide to NDIS participants, including risks to participants and workers and risks associated with the provision of supports.

This includes identifying and managing risks of possible COVID-19 infection of yourself, your workers and people you otherwise engage to deliver NDIS supports, as well as the risk of infection of NDIS participants.

The withdrawal of critical supports and services without consultation with a participant and their support network could constitute a breach of the NDIS Code of Conduct or NDIS Practice Standards.

Infection prevention should be a focus of your outbreak planning. If a participant you provide critical supports to tests positive to COVID-19 or is identified as a close contact, you should:

• consult with the participant and their support network about their preferences for continuing supports;  continue delivering critical supports in line with this or work with them to arrange alternative supports if your continued provision of supports if changes are required, or usual supports are unable to be maintained in their regular way
• use appropriate personal protective equipment (PPE) while delivering supports, in accordance with advice from your public health unit (PHU) 
• ensure your outbreak planning includes deploying vaccinated staff and knowing in advance which staff are willing to work with participants that may be confirmed or suspected of having COVID-19. Have contingencies in place to source additional staff, if required. This should be part of your workforce contingency plan
• ensure you have important information about your workers and participants at hand if required by public health units, such as their vaccination status and workers with secondary employment.

Notification of changes or events

You must notify the NDIS Commission of any change or event that significantly affects your ability to comply with any of your conditions of registration, including compliance with the NDIS Practice Standards. You must use the COVID-19 notification of events form to report these changes.

Your requirements to notify the NDIS Commission of reportable incidents under the National Disability Insurance Scheme (Incident Management and Reportable Incidents) Rules 2018 are separate from the COVID-19 notification of changes or events and remain unchanged.  

Outbreak preparedness

Registered NDIS providers have obligations to have outbreak management and business continuity plans which:

• identify which supports are critical for the health, wellbeing and safety of a person with disability
• identify and assess risks to people you support, your workers and to the organisation, and implement controls to mitigate these.

For guidance on preventing and managing COVID-19 outbreaks in disability residential settings, please refer to the Communicable Diseases Network Australia’s (CDNA) disability supplement.

Additionally, the NDIS Commission’s fact sheet on outbreak preparedness provides information on preparing for, preventing and managing an outbreak in disability settings. 

You should consider the following as part of your emergency planning and preparedness:

• review and update your emergency plans, including arrangements to ensure that you meet your obligations to maintain continuity of support to NDIS participants
• outline workforce contingency plans in the event of an outbreak
• set up an outbreak management team with an incident controller
• establish a COVID-19 incident reporting process.

Supporting participants

• Continue to provide support to people with disability to have safe community access for essential supports (such as exercising, essential shopping, accessing the COVID-19 vaccine, or attending medical appointments).
• Identify any participants who have advance care or healthcare or support plans, and keep a copy.
• If any participants are at higher risk, prepare a hospital bag with things they might need for an overnight stay.

Infection control

• Implement standard infection control precautions throughout all work places.
• Ensure all your workers are familiar with and practice sound infection control, physical distancing and hygiene practices throughout all work places.
• Ensure all workers have been trained and have had refreshers on infection control and use of Personal Protective Equipment (PPE).
• Undertake a stocktake of PPE and consumables to ensure you have adequate PPE stock in the event of a confirmed or suspected infection.
• Source additional supplies if necessary.
• Plan for increased environmental cleaning.
• Develop an appropriate isolation approach, should one become necessary.
• Minimise staff working across multiple sites.

Communications

• Establish communication channels to keep your workforce informed.
• Review strategies for communicating with participants and their support networks.

Promoting access to COVID-19 Vaccinations

Information about access to COVID-19 vaccinations should be promoted, to both the NDIS participants you support and your workers.

Supporting NDIS participants to access COVID-19 vaccinations

Our provider alert of 9 June 2021 contained resources to help you to support them to understand the vaccination process and to provide informed consent.

Our fact sheet, called ‘COVID-19 Vaccines: Informed consent, preparing for the vaccine, and restrictive practices’, aims to assist NDIS providers to better understand their obligations when supporting people with disability to receive the COVID-19 vaccine.

The Australian Government Department of Health (Department of Health) has published an information page on their website for people with disability about COVID-19 vaccines. This page contains important information for providers and participants about COVID-19 vaccines, and will be updated regularly. A range of Easy Read and Auslan resources about the COVID-19 vaccines are also available. We strongly encourage you to visit these resources and share them with the people with disability that you support.

Vaccination advice and information for disability workers

The Department of Health issued a Disability Provider Alert on 12 July 2021. This alert contained strong encouragement from National Cabinet for all disability workers to get vaccinated against COVID-19, to protect your own health and the health of the people with disability you support.

We encourage you to read the full details in the alert.

The Department of Health has dedicated information pages for disability service providers about COVID-19 vaccines.

• Providers: The webpage for disability service providers contains information and resources to help you plan for the COVID-19 vaccine rollout.
• Disability workers: The webpage for disability workers contains information and resources about COVID-19 vaccines for disability workers.

The Department of Health will continue to update the information on these pages, so we strongly encourage you to visit these pages regularly.

NDIS Commission COVID-19 information and resources

The Coronavirus (COVID-19) information webpage on the NDIS Commission website contains links to updates, training, alerts and other resources.

We also have a COVID-19 webpage containing information for people with disability, and a webpage of frequently asked questions about COVID-19 for all stakeholders.

Contact us

Call: 1800 035 544 (free call from landlines). Our contact centre is open 9.00am to 5.00pm (9.00am to 4.30pm in the NT), Monday to Friday, excluding public holidays.

Email: contactcentre@ndiscommission.gov.au

Website: www.ndiscommission.gov.au