Opposition Leader Anthony Albanese has demanded Aged Care Services Minister Richard Colbeck resign or be sacked, over the 566 aged care deaths since the start of the Omicron wave.
Mr Albanese said residents - some 15,000 of whom had been infected - were missing out on showers, meals or having their wounds tended to as a quarter of shifts went unfilled due to 17,000 cases among staff.
"This is just an extraordinary response. Is it the suggestion the department was not looking at those issues that they had to set up a task force?" he said.
"A (proper) announcement would be the government saying that they are going to take serious action.
"Instead, what we have is a minister who says there is no crisis and a government that says bureaucrats are going to collect data."
The Labor leader backed better pay and conditions for aged care workers, but wouldn't be pinned down on the union's request for a 25 per cent increase.
Of about 190,000 aged care residents, 125,000 have had a booster. This is despite 99 per cent of facilities already being visited by vaccination teams.
Labor has savaged the federal government's move to set up a task force scrutinising more than 560 COVID-19 deaths in aged care since the start of the Omicron wave.
Chief Medical Officer Paul Kelly lauded Australia's "spectacularly low rate of death" from the virus while announcing the task force because of the disproportionate rate of aged care fatalities.
People over 70 accounted for 84 per cent of 1103 deaths between December 15 and the end of January, while those aged 90-plus made up 24 per cent.
But Professor Kelly stressed the overall national death rate from Omicron was 0.1 per cent.
"We are looking to try and get more details about those deaths. It is not an easy thing, the numbers have been challenging in terms of getting detailed information from that situation," he said on Thursday.
Health Minister Greg Hunt called on residents who had not had any vaccines or a booster to take up the opportunity, while Prof Kelly noted some people in palliative care were declining to get another jab.
"Our role as medical practitioners and the role of the sector is to respect the wishes of people in that setting ... allow them to experience the last parts of their life in the way they have chosen," the chief medical officer said.
He flagged one state in particular, which he declined to name, would provide the federal government with "granular detail" about its aged care deaths.
This data would be extrapolated to the rest of the country.
Senator Colbeck on Wednesday denied the aged care sector was in crisis and insisted it was performing extremely well considering the circumstances.
At the same time, the federal government is rolling out $800 bonus payments in a bid to stop aged care workers leaving the sector.
Australian Associated Press
