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Milestone anniversary For Elaine Dalli, the 20 years she has lived at Doutta Galla Woornack in Sunshine have meant more to her than most. “Woornack is home for me and will always be for a lifetime,” she said. Mrs Dalli moved into the residential aged care facility on June 6, 2003. On the same date, exactly 20 years later, celebrations were in order to mark the milestone. Personalised chocolates, flowers and balloons were rolled out as Mrs Dalli celebrated the occasion. “I will never leave this place,” she said. “Every staff member here is like family or friends to me.” Overlooking the willow trees and grasslands of Kororoit Creek reserve, Doutta Galla Woornack is a community based not-for-profit organisation that has served Melbourne’s west since 1991. Doutta Galla Woornack lifestyle and leisure co-ordinator Carina Hollenkamp said she has known Mrs Dalli for more than 10 years. “It is important for us to look after the overall happiness and wellbeing of our residents. Elaine has lived with us for 20 years and has loved every single day that she is here,” she said.
Elaine Dalli celebrated her 20th year of residency at the Doutta Galla Woornack aged care facility. (Jacob Pattison) 339209_01
Health champs honoured By Hannah Hammoud During some of Melbourne’s toughest weeks in lockdown, checking for the daily COVID-19 case numbers became a routine part of people’s day-to-day lives. Brimbank local Anthony Macali is the founder of the CovidLive.com.au website which quickly became a trusted point of call for data and information relating to COVID-19 in Australia. Marking the King’s official birthday, Mr Macali has been honoured for his contribution to community health and awarded a Medal of the Order of Australia (OAM).
Landing a spot on the COVID-19 honour roll, Mr Macali was awarded the honour for his contributions during the long-haul course of the pandemic, compiling storms of data from across the country into easy to digest numbers. As shops closed and many Melburnians were sent off to work from home, Mr Macali put his skills as a data analyst to work. “I was worried about what was going on and just wanted to find out what the case numbers were and look for any other data that was out there,” he said. “What I found wasn’t very much and it was really difficult to get information. All you could find was a report that came out once a day and
when it was published it was already a few hours behind.” Mr Macali took things into his own hands and tuned in to the press conferences from each state and territory every day, tracking the COVID statistics for the country for three long years. At its peak, Mr Macali’s website had more than 200,000 visitors a day. His advocacy for vaccination rates to be made publicly available resulted in a commitment from the federal government to publish the data at the earliest opportunity available. Mr Macali said the website served as an outlet for people to gain a sense of control in a
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time of great uncertainty. Despite his dedicated efforts, he said news of his award still came as a “big surprise” to him. “I have always received positive feedback from users of the website, but it is nice to be recognised officially,” he said. “We’ve all gone into a new phase of returning back to normal after the pandemic and we’ve quickly forgotten about it, but it is nice to have those difficult times acknowledged, it’s a small reminder of how tough it was and how we all pooled together to help each other.” ■ Continued: Page 6.
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