Analysing the impact of the Australian health sector emergency response plan for Novel Coronavirus (COVID-19): A proposed approach

The COVID-19 pandemic has forced Australia, and our global counterparts, on a steep learning curve and rapid adaptation journey. Understanding the real impact of pandemic response interventions will be crucial to our collective success in this ongoing endeavour. This article will propose and outline an integrated, sequential, mixed methods approach to analysing the impact of Australia’s emergency response to the COVID-19 pandemic across its states and territories. We begin with a brief description of the Australian Health Sector Emergency Response Plan for Novel Coronavirus (COVID-19). In the second section, the discussion will move on to defining the nature of impact analysis and evaluation and when to use them. The third section outlines considerations relevant to selecting an impact analysis approach as it pertains to infectious disease pandemic response and virus transmission, morbidity and mortality outcomes. The fourth section presents and discusses a conceptual framework for an integrated impact analysis approach, clearly delineating the link between proposed approach, impact analysis questions and the outlined pandemic response considerations.