I’m having difficulty in understanding social distancing rules? It seems ok to stand in a queue to vote but a funeral must be limited to 10 mourners. It seems ok for hairdressers to continue to work, but beaches must be closed because the bathers are getting too close?
Has this pandemic shown us how ineffective our political system is ? Or are we just lacking leadership? I can understand why we need to take advice from WHO , but we always seem to be behind the pace? Russia closed its borders, and started contact tracing, in January. I’m not suggesting Russia is a model to follow or a country I would like to live in , merely pointing to decisive leadership.
Not having a go at you, nor am I necessarily defending the Govt or leadership, but what exactly do you think they should do? Are you suggesting a full lockdown?
Seems that most people are screaming that the Govt "should do more!!!" but I think it seems to be a lot of people who would not vote Libs in any situation.
Personally, I dont want the Govt to do more, or do less. I want them to take the advice of ALL the experts available to them to chart a course that navigates the tricky path of minimising deaths, ensuring our health system is not overwhelmed yet maintaining the maximum economic heartbeat possible.
Of course the natural reaction is to think to stop everything, shut down everything in total lockdown, and it may come to that and be necessary if it looks like it will overwhelm the health system, and Id be all for it in those circumstances, but if it is possible to reduce the rate of spread to a point that the health system can cope, yet keep as much of the economy running, then for me that is the best path.
This may seem callous for want of a better word, but when this is over, we are going to need to climb out of it and the depth of the decline economically will have a massive impact on many peoples lives for years to come and it will be the lower socioeconomic levels hit hardest. Rich people with assets will make it through.
The natural reaction is always 1 death is too many, but we average 4500 deaths a year for influenza and we dont shut down the economy to save those deaths. I am NOT suggeting this is the same as the flu, its not and if we did nothing there would be more than 10 x that number dead, but there does need to be a balance between possibility of deaths and possibility of economic depression.
5150, I’m not having a go at you either and I’m not wanting to get into a any pee high club discussion.
Just pointing out my observation that we always appear to be a country which follows, rather than one which gets on the front foot instinctively and decisively does what’s best for Australia and it’s citizens. There was a time when citizenship meant something. Anyway, cheer on your club if you like, but it doesn’t explain the failings in our political system.
Here’s an example..
https://www.thecourier.com.au/story/6698458/hairdressers-call-for-clear-messaging-directive-to-close-from-government/
Mate I dont necessarily disagree with you and I am **definitely** not wanting to get into a club discussion, in fact I dont actually feel like I have a club in this discussion, definitely not one Im cheering on.
Part of what prompted me to respond to your post was listening to discussions about what is going on in the UK. Their strategy is a bit different to what is going on in Italy & US and to a great extent appears to be a lot more successful. Their strategy is not based on auto lock down but involves lock down when required.
Im not sure what you are specifically referring to when you say the Govt which follows, particularly when we were the second country to shut borders to China, Iran & Italy. It is entirely possible that the strategy that the Aus Govt is following, on the advice of their experts, is entirely intentional and what is happening is EXACTLY what they are trying to do, but merely is different to the instinctive reaction of the general population, who aren't aware of the advice they are getting from the expertise.
Obviously not everyone is listening to the same experts.
I don’t have a problem with the governments staggered approach, although the downside is they need to wait 14 days to see what’s working. It was usually the approach I’ve taken, whether in business or with my health. If we follow the Shorten / Albo approach which is ‘throw the kitchen sink at it and hope for the best, then if it doesn’t work it’s harder to find out why. Or if it does work we can only speculate which remedy was more effective. I don’t know if the enormity of our problem is registering with some. I’ve heard from Doc the damage the virus causes to the lungs is irreparable.
It is hard to argue with the measures so far when the data is starting to turn for us, we know have to see if we need to make more restrictions to get it turn enough!
I was not going to post this for a few days to see how it panned out, but what you are saying correlates well with it. Four days ago the exponential rate of growth dropped markedly from a steady 1.23 - 1.25 down to 1.13. But since then it seems to have instantly found a new steady level with four days 1.13, 1.15, 1.13, 1.14. Hoping it drops again but if it stays there, more measures might be needed.
Well a couple of people wanted an update so here we are.....
Yesterday there was a significant dip in the exponential growth multiplier. It dipped down from a steady 1.3 for a few days, down below 1.1 to 1.09. This is pretty significant as it may be the second round of restrictions washing through. For those playing along at home, to be steady at 1.1 we need less that 4382 cases by the end of today.
This is obviously encouraging as slowing it down is obviously a good thing, but how does this end? At what point do we start thinking about re-opening the economy (Im not suggesting soon)?
I could imagine a scenario where parts of the local economy are reopened, but with disasters all over the world (US and parts of Europe), once its under control here I can see our borders closed for a LONG time.
Ok so something is definitely happening and so far it looks good. Another big dip yesterday in the exponential growth multiplier . It was steady at 1.23 for weeks, then spent four days at 1.13 and has spent the last two days going down. 1.09 Sunday and 1.06 yesterday.
Its very encouraging and shows that the restrictions and changes in behaviour are working. I have a couple of worries. People are behaving better, but not perfectly (we are Aussies) and I dont think we can get that multiplier down to 1 based on restrictions alone, so what does that mean? We get to a low multiplier (growth rate) and stay indoors?
I also worry that if we get teh growth rate low enough people will say "screw this" and go back to normal life and rates will bounce back up.
Anyway, so far so good. For those playing along, to keep it at 1.06 we need to keep the total to under 4523. At the time of posting (9:30) it was already 4364.
Another update. Yesterday stayed pretty steady with exponential multiplier of 1.06. I can see some merit in Mikes comment about reduced testing however. TO stay steady at 1.06 we need todays cases to stay below 4830. We are at 4711 already at 9am.
Todays update. Yesterday was steady, very steady unfortunately. After an encouraging dip in the exponential multiplier, we have now had three days steady at 1.06.
Hoping the stricter measures start to wash through and we are not stuck here.
Need to keep total cases under 5150 today.
Todays update.
A slight dip again yesterday. After three days at 1.06, the exponential multiplier dipped slightly to 1.05. Hopefully continues down but we might be getting to the point of diminishing returns. To maintain 1.05 growth or less, we need todays total to stay under 5400.
Had a thought this morning when considering someone else pointing out that new cases seem to be almost staying under 300 a day and this being a good thing. I agree that relative to what could be it is a reasonable result, but at current death rates, that would still 3-4 deaths a day (delayed by 20 days).
Update for Friday 03/04/20
Another encouraging dip in the exponential multiplier. Dropped down from 1.056 to 1.041. Very encouraging. To maintain 1.04 we need the total cases to remain under 5570 today. at 10am they are still at last nights total 5350.
