Australian Flu Epidemic Shuts Down Sydney ED

As the flu epidemic continues to cripple the state's health system, an entire Sydney emergency department has been shut down because the private hospital's operators failed to maintain staff levels.

Private patients in The Hills district are now being shunted into the overloaded public system, which is already buckling under more than 3000 extra suspected flu cases flooding emergency departments in the past week alone.

The crisis comes as yet another person, a South Australian health worker, has died after being infected with the killer influenza A virus sweeping the country.

The Daily Telegraph can also reveal that a Sydney doctor is in intensive care at North Shore Private Hospital after catching influenza A.

Adding even further to the health system's woes, there has been an outbreak of a superbug at Bankstown Hospital's intensive care unit.

The Hills Private Hospital is now being investigated by the State Government to determine if it has breached its licence by failing to keep its emergency department open amid one of the worst flu epidemics in more than 20 years.

Documents obtained by The Daily Telegraph reveal that the hospital asked ambulances to bypass its emergency department on Monday because they did not have enough staff.

It is understood ambulance service CEO Greg Rochford told the hospital's CEO Stephen Tameren ambulances had cancelled all emergency services to the hospital until further notice.

The Hills emergency department was crippled after a doctor called in sick and the hospital was unable to find a replacement for him.

The hospital claims the department is now fully staffed and operational but the ambulance service refuses to take patients there because it does not consider the emergency department reliable.

Meanwhile, NSW Health data released yesterday reveals the flu infection rate has skyrocketed by more than 50 per cent from 5.5 people per 1000 presenting symptoms to 8.7 per 1000 in the past two weeks, with 23,400 presentations in the past week.

At Bankstown Hospital, five people have been quarantined after contracting a superbug in the ICU, causing a critical bed shortage.