Young Isaac has been waiting for over two years for surgery for severe sleep apnoea. The five-year-old was scheduled to go into PCH today and up until last night, the family were told it was going ahead. This morning they were told it had been cancelled due to the latest COVID restrictions.

Isaac’s father Trent Wearne told Oliver Peterson his son wakes up over 30 times an hour every night and falls asleep late afternoon with his school learning also suffering due to his tiredness.

“He gets to the end of the day and he’s asleep by 5:30pm,” said Mr Wearne.

“We really had our hearts set on this [surgery] happening today.

“To have the rug pulled out from underneath us this morning was hard to take.”

Isaac has completed sleep studies in order to be put on the wait list for a 45-minute operation to remove his tonsils and adenoids.

Mr Wearne questioned the decision by the McGowan Government to cancel certain elective surgeries over the small outbreak.

“The hospitals are already under the pump and we don’t have a COVID problem here,” he said.

“What would happen if we had a massive COVID outbreak? The state system would have collapsed in five minutes.”

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