Chief Health Officer

About the Chief Health Officer

The Victorian Government's Chief Health Officer is responsible for a variety of statutory functions under the Health and Food Acts including closure of food premises; recall of food products, pharmaceuticals, poisons; closure of water sources, amenities, fisheries; restraint/detention of persons endangering the public health; and works approvals regarding the health consequences of mining, infrastructure projects etc.

The Chief Health Officer also acts as the Government's media spokesperson on matters relating to the control of disease and the promotion of health as required eg communicable diseases, land/air/water contamination, radiation, food safety, ethics, public health emergencies. The Chief Health Officer is also reponsible for Health Intelligence that monitors and reports on the health status of Victorians.

Dr John Carnie
Chief Health Officer
50 Lonsdale Street
Melbourne 3000
Victoria, Australia

Phone: (61 3) 9096 0376
Email: chief.healthofficer@dhs.vic.gov.au

HIV and Viral Loads

The Chief Health Officer supports the UNAIDS Statement (36kb, pdf)

Bird flu

On Wednesday 14 January 2004, the World Health Organization (WHO) announced an alert regarding an outbreak of avian influenza in Asia. Since mid-December 2003, outbreaks of avian influenza (H5N1 strain) infection have been detected in the poultry populations of the Republic of Korea, Japan, Vietnam, Thailand, Indonesia and Cambodia. To date, there are only a small numbers of laboratory confirmed cases of H5N1 infection in humans. To date, the WHO has no evidence that person-to-person transmission is occurring, with all of the cases appearing to have been infected through contact with diseased birds.

National Information Hotline - public enquiries

A national information phone line for enquiries from the public is provided by:

Commonwealth Department of Health and Ageing
Telephone 1800 004 599
8.30am to 5.00pm EST - Monday to Friday*

* A recorded message is activated after hours

More information

• Vigilance for Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza (HPAI or Influenza A H5N1): An update for Victorian General Practitioners and Hospital Medical Officers – December 2007
• Infectious Diseases, Edipemiology & Surveillance
• World Health Organisation
• Pandemic influenza

Bioterrorism - Use of Biological Agents and Chemicals as Weapons

Information and links about the use of biological agents and chemicals as weapons. It should be noted that Victoria has a mechanism for identifying, investigating and containing cases of communicable diseases, details of which are included in this document.

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