With grey nomads still grappling with the practical implications of the new border restrictions and desperately trying to work out how they are expected to behave in the face of the escalating coronavirus crisis, it is becoming very clear that they can no longer be confident of receiving a warm welcome everywhere they go.
While no legal barriers are yet in place to stop visitors entering the township of Robe in South Australia, the council is one of the first in the state to strongly encourage people not to visit.
The District Council of Robe met on Sunday to discuss the state’s decision to close borders and enforce a two-week self-isolation period for anyone entering or re-entering South Australia from Tuesday afternoon.
The ABC reports that the town’s Mayor, Alison Nunan, said an influx at this time was something they were likely not prepared to deal with.
Ms Nunan said she observed a number of visitors on the weekend who were there to self-isolate.
“It was very clear that people had made a beeline for Robe, and I can’t blame them for that. If I was going to self-isolate I’d like to self-isolate at Robe,” she said. “It was very evident that people were not observing social distancing.”
While a popular destination for grey nomads without a permanent base, the Mayor warned them to stay elsewhere given the current climate.
“The impact on us [if someone does have coronavirus] is going to be far greater than if they turn up to a place like Mount Gambier, which has a large hospital and can deal with these problems in comparison to us,” Ms Nunan said.
The ABC reports that Ms Nunan was especially concerned for the town’s older residents.
“Somebody [visiting] will bring that virus with them. It won’t be intentional, but chances are it will happen,” she said. “We have a significant number of older people in our community and we just feel as though the economic pain that we’re going to experience will be short-lived [in comparison to health threats].”
Economically, April is one of Robe’s biggest times of the year and one they rely on financially between Easter and the school holidays.
However, the Mayor did say it was crucial that any visitors still opting to self-isolate in Robe should have local support to protect others in the community.
“If they’re not supported by people who can maybe do some grocery shopping for them, they will have to go out into the community to get supplies,” she said.
The owner of the Robe Holiday Park, Keryn Moore, has also moved quickly to assure confused grey nomads that they are welcome to self-isolate on the park’s 30 acres of land.
“If they’re fully self-contained and they’re willing to keep to themselves we can accommodate that,” Ms Moore said. “They should feel safe to come into a town to self-isolate.”
She said she was also okay with the visitors that were at the holiday park to ‘sit it out’ for a couple of weeks.
Sitting close to the border with Victoria, Robe has a population of around d 1,000 and has one doctor, one clinic, and one chemist. The ABC reports that the local ambulance is run on skeleton staff and the resident doctor has had trouble accessing personal protection equipment.
The District Council of Robe will meet again Tuesday night to reassess the situation.
how can you isolate for a fortnight in a caravan?
Comfortably. Shower, toilet, all the mod cons.
I was shocked to read the Mayor’s comments about grey nomads visiting Robe.
The council met on Sunday, two days before the SA border closed; so the comments about grey nomads already arrivng to self isolate were a nonsense.
Many grey nomads live permanently on the road and many at Robe would not have family or friends in the township.
This would drastically reduce their sphere of social interaction compared to locals who live in the town, who have children at school, who work in town, or work daily out of town and return in the evenings, etc.
And what of the Robe locals and their visiting relatives from other parts of SA?
If they are the demographic that have children at schools, work, are retired and look after the grand kids, then they would be interacting with a far wider range of the community than the grey nomads.
I hope all grey nomads remember Robe’s attitude to them when this is over.