Today I am ashamed to be called an Australian. As the Indian medical system collapses, The Australian Government has proposed to gaol people who travel back to Australia from nominated Red Zones via a secondary country.
I believe instead of this, the Australia should be sending planes over, QANTAS, RAAF, Private Jets, anything they can get their hands on, I don’t care, to get as many Australian home from these Red Zones as soon as possible. They can spend three weeks in quarantine upon return to protect the Australian community here. Even use remote locations if they are overly concerned of outbreaks.
Additionally the Australian Government should be sending supplies, medical equipment, oxygen and whatever the Indian medical system needs ASAP. Instead of the inadequate response so far. We should be doing everything we can in our power to help India out of the terrible predicament they are in.
This is an absolute disgrace.
Sorry . ? disagree . We have to be vigilant , and maintain our high standards in the face of adversity . We need to protect the people that are here , which means upholding existing protocols , especially because the Indian strain could be introducing a huge amount of hurt to the Australian population.
I highly doubt we arnt offering aid to them , but we can’t flush the baby with the bath water . It sounds cold , and inhumane , but Australians leaders first and primary mandate is to keep Australians safe .
Which means vetting and quarantining all who come home , in due course . Otherwise , all the good work we’ve done over the last 18 months will be brought undone .
Once we get our population vaccinated , then we can begin to relax , but doing what you suggest , shows complacency IMO , and we are so close to the finish line .
Not at all being complacent. They still need to go into Quarantine. I’m suggesting 3 weeks not 2. I’m not suggesting they be allowed directly into community. They can put the high risk in the NT facilities, that will protect the population here.
To propose gaol for Australians trying to get home anyway they can is a disgrace and disgusting. We should be doing everything we can to get them safely home ASAP.
I’d say the Gaol is just about queue jumping , and a scare tactic . If they could safely increase the volume of people returning to manage any spread , I’m sure they will. But in all seriousness , whole hotels are dedicated now , to just being predominantly quarantine zones , and I’d say that they’re chosen by how well they can enforce a lockdown , and as such are limited by the amount of beds and rooms they can provide . As far as I understood it , you can’t just check into a random Best Western .
I understand your sentiment , but you can’t save everyone , and I personally would not be happy if the government put the lives of many in this country at risk , to save the few. It’s cold , yea maybe , but it’s the right choice .
It’s akin to being on a flight , and the the oxygen masks fall. Your first priority is to fit your own , as your no help to anyone incapacitated.
If we relax the protocols we could be incapacitated, and then we arnt letting anyone in .
I do hate the fact that there are Australians that can't come home, I never thought I would see a situations where there are 1000's of Australians stranded like this in such terrible situations. The issue is though I don't know of a better answer
Yea I’m with you man . I sound like a massive prick , I know that . But it has to be this way . The kind of decisions that mess people up forever , are getting made now .
Its actually really distressing to me that we have people that can't return home, it is such a hard situation as because of what is going on overseas we have to take away some of the things that make Australia Australia. Never did I think I would live to see the day where we closed our borders to our own people. It kind of feels like being on a lift raft and paddling away from friends that are in the water drowning, but if we paddle over to them the entire life raft could sink.
It is a real dilemma for me just thinking about the right options because the answer that is probably right answer goes against my own personal moral fibre and the moral fibre of what makes our country important to me. I am so glad it is not my decision to make as I don't know if I could make one
It’s the old question of how much is one life worth ? Is one death the same as a million deaths . Or is the “greater good , to protect the many and cast the few ?
The reality is , in nature . It’s usually the latter as much as we want to tell ourselves differently.
Still doesn’t make it any less crappy though .
The thing is I think we will get them home, just not as quickly as we would like. One thing it does raise for me though is why are we about to send a large number of athletes overseas when if something goes wrong we can't bring them home.
Exactly. The infrastructure is there to do it, just not the will. Disgusting by the Australian Government. I won't forget.
I don't think the infrastructure is there to do it though, every time we have increased capacity there have been leaks in quarantine. Even looking at the numbers, in the last 2 days there have been close to 30 new cases in NSW quarantine hotels.
There are plenty of places that people can be housed in quarantine for three weeks. NT, unused military bases, unused mining facilities/camps even immigration detention centres. Hell even build a temporary base somewhere if needed. We can do it but we are all feeling a bit too comfortable back here in Oz. We just to think outside the box and be more compassionate.
The strict international border restrictions are the only thing that has allowed us to truly stay on top of this thing.
Not saying they should come back here and be released into the community. They need to be in quarantine for three weeks. We just don’t have the will to do it. We are talking about a max of 8,000 people in India I believe. It really isn’t impossible todo and maintain our quarantine processes. Worst case is we build a temporary tent city quarantine facility, preferably right outside Parliament House in Canberra to remind them of their obligations to Australian Citizens.
NSW is taking about 3000 arrivals per week, most of the other states are barely coping with 500. There are people all over the world who have been trying to get home for months but these caps have stopped them from getting here. We have been closed to losing control of this virus on a number of occasions and every time it has been because of leaks in quarantine. Even in the last couple of days we had someone enter the green zone in Brisbane. We are barely controlling this and the vaccine rollout is not progressing well. The slow vaccine rollout means we can't really afford to take risks.
What risk? It’s still quarantining returning Australians. It’s very manageable if we put our minds to it.
We have shown over the last 12 months that it is not manageable though, we are constantly getting breeches of and cases transmitted in quarantine. Victoria went into lockdown for months due to breeches in quarantine. The cases inside our quarantine are rising at present, that is already putting us at higher risk of leak. I don't think we can afford to increase numbers, despite my wish to do so.
Disagree. It’s manageable. You just need to get the right people to do it and have the right processes in place.
Who are these right people? Obviously not the people we have doing it now.
NSW seem to be doing OK after they changed the procedures on flight crew as a result of the Northern Beaches outbreak. No further outbreaks other than the odd case within hotel quarantine. None in the community.
NSW is doing remarkably well, but there have been 30 new cases in NSW quarantine in the last 2 days due to the increases in India. Increase in cases provides greater risk for a leak from quarantine.
