Infestation of Red Back Spiders in Queensland forces closure of hospital

A small Central Queensland hospital has been forced to close because of an infestation of potentially deadly redback spiders.

Queensland Health says spiders were previously only found in the ceiling of the Baralaba Multi Purpose Health Service, but recent warm weather has provided them with a good breeding environment in the main section of the hospital.

Experts have blamed warm, humid conditions on an infestation of deadly redback spiders that has forced a Central Queensland hospital to shut its doors.

The Baralaba Multi Purpose Health Service, about four hours north-west of Bundaberg, will be closed for 24 hours while pest controllers fumigate the building, which has come under attack from the poisonous arachnids for several months.

Only three hospital patients and aged care residents are expected to be affected by the closure.

Queensland Health said the patients would be transferred to nearby Moura Hospital, and arrangements made for a GP to treat anyone who needed urgent medical attention in Baralaba, home to about 290 people.

Queensland Health’s rural director of nursing, Ellen Palmer, said the hospital had always had problems with redbacks, but recently numbers had got out of control.

She said attempts to keep the spiders at bay with monthly spraying had failed, leaving fumigation the only option.

The process will have to be repeated in five weeks’ time.

“We thought the best way to ensure minimal disruption to patients was to move them out for 24 hours,” Ms Palmer told brisbanetimes.com.au.

“The spiders are mostly in the ceiling but we are also finding them in the main part of the hospital.

“I wouldn’t say it was a plague. We believe the best way to deal with them, and the safest option for staff and patients, is to have the whole building fumigated so both the spiders and their eggs are killed.”

Pest controller Bruce Dekker said even though there had been little rain in the area recently, high humidity had created perfect breeding conditions for redbacks and other nasties, including termites and mosquitoes.

“We have been inundated,” Mr Dekker said.

“We have had them in toys and Tonka Trucks, under kids’ bike seats and even in toys and sand pits where kids are playing.”