Australia will also send one million surgical masks,200,000 respirator masks,100,000 gowns,100,000 goggles,100,000 pairs of gloves,100,000 bottles of sanitiser,20,000 face shields and 200 non-invasive ventilators to the country. Defence is also sending 2000 tents to help triage patients at Port Moresby Hospital.

The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade is dispatching a medical team to carry out “critical needs analysis” and help open more testing centres,with 19 of the 22 provinces in PNG recording some kind of COVID-19 outbreak.

Fears about the extent of the outbreak escalated over the weekend,with Port Moresby General Hospital recording about 20 per cent of the women presenting in labour having symptoms of COVID-19.

From January 3 to March 16 there have been 2351 confirmed cases of COVID-19,with 26 deaths reported,but the country’s low testing rates have raised concerns the true extent of the outbreak is much worse.

Chief Medical Officer Professor Paul Kelly said because of the lack of testing resources,any numbers coming out of PNG in terms of cases and deaths would be “a major underestimate”.

“When people are being admitted into hospitals in Port Moresby,half of women who are coming in due to pregnancy are positive,we’re seeing a large number of healthcare workers on the frontlines in Papua New Guinea Now coming down with COVID-19,” he said.

Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszcuzk said her health department would “assist where possible”.

“We know that there are some of those bordering communities in PNG that are very close to the Torres Strait,so of course that is going to be a priority for us to help with any vaccination program there,” she said.

“This is a real risk. It is something that we actually raised very early on in the pandemic but we did not see any COVID cases in PNG,but what we do know now is that the numbers are starting to rise and they are quite alarming.“

Marc Purcell,chief executive of the Australian Council for International Development,said the package of measures was needed and gives PNG a “fighting chance”.

“Not only is this a crisis for PNG,it is currently the biggest threat to Australia’s domestic response to COVID-19. We have already seen the very real risk posed to Queenslanders play out at Cairns Hospital,” he said.

“In addition to the international transmission,the major risk for the epidemic within communities in PNG is that the virus takes hold,spreads further and mutates,just like the UK and South African variants.”

Mat Tinkler,Deputy CEO Save the Children Australia,said there was a “human catastrophe brewing on Australia’s doorstep”,so Australia’s intervention was “timely,strategic and the right thing to do”.

“We should be doing everything in our power to support what the Prime Minister has dubbed our ‘Pacific family’. PNG was there for Australia in our ‘hour of need’ of need in WWII,and we must be there for PNG now,” he said.