Australian Reports of the Virus Spread

[drron]

Of the NSW cases with genomic testing has revealed they are related to the Victorian hotel quarantine.Same goes for the QLD recent cases in the Community.
So QLD was lucky as the girls who brought it back from Melbourne were not super spreaders.NSW was unlucky as the Crossroads initial case was.

 

[jakeseven7]

Well of course that’s a given and the same all around the world except China. But my point is that NSW manages the process well so can’t the reason for the current bubbling.

There is a HUGE degree of good luck happening in NSW, so let’s hope that luck continues and all their mystery cases have just burned out and are not spreading in undetected clusters.

Fingers crossed.

 

[jakeseven7]

Im also not convinced that other states are doing a significantly better job than NSW, there has been a huge degree of luck. Queensland are lucky the Melbourne Shoplifting trio didnt infect more people, another case today of border control failure today with the teenagers in Noosa, only been found out on their lie days after entering.

Completely agree there has been a tremendous amount of good luck in NSW and QLD, especially given lapsed social distancing and ongoing non adherence to COVIDSafe plans, so let’s hope that the good luck holds out

I wish that the premiere would close down pokies, make masks on PT mandatory and ban religious gatherings - to help get numbers down more

Many don’t believe NSW have built an appropriate level of PPE to mandate such a change on masks yet unfortunately. The government has been dodging answering this question so I suspect they are busy building up stocks then will make a call.

I also feel that we will be in limbo forever as the zero cases ongoing goal isnt realistic due to reasons previously stated.

Yup and NSW will be locked out of travel to other states as a result... is this right? Depends who you listen to...

If NSW gets to zero community transmission for whatever period the other states demand, and then there is another case slamming the borders shut again with short notice, NSW residents will just write off those states as no go zones.

Or just lots of last minute bookings which also doesn’t really work for the tourism industry....

 

[blackcat20]

Winter is nearly done - I must admit at the weekend I was thinking longingly of Port Douglas, but once it gets to Spring it lovely here. No Floriade this year though

By the time we're allowed to travel north, it'll be warm enough down south that we wont need to. I just want to go somewhere at this point, I don't really care where.

 

[Denali]

NT going to stay closed for 18mths?

NT border policed for at least 18 months, closed to VIC indefinitely

Northern Territory Chief Minister Michael Gunner has revealed he will keep the Territory’s border guarded for at least another 18 months from Tuesday and recruit extra police to keep the barriers in place.

www.news.com.au

 

[HappyFlyerFamily]

vic 331 cases and 19 deaths reported today

 

[HappyFlyerFamily]

It’s on now.


Parliament's Public Accounts and Estimates Committee will begin a second round of hearings today to exam the Andrews Government's response to the COVID‑19 pandemic.

Premier Daniel Andrews is listed to appear first, ahead of the Health Minister Jenny Mikakos and Chief Health Officer Brett Sutton.

Also listed to appear are senior public servants including the secretary to the Department of Premier and Cabinet Chris Eccles and the secretary to the Department of Health and Human Services Kym Peake.

They're all expected to face questions about their knowledge and handling of the hotel quarantine system.

 

[Lynda2475]

By the time we're allowed to travel north, it'll be warm enough down south that we wont need to. I just want to go somewhere at this point, I don't really care where.

Me too. So sick of the inside of my home and only ever going to my local supermarket and cafe.

 

[Lynda2475]

NT going to stay closed for 18mths

If this is so, they really should stop wasting their tourist advertising budget running visit NT ads every commercial break on FTA in Sydney during Prime time. I dont watch a lot of FTA, but it seems during the news and the project every other advert is for the NT.

 

[Gremlin]

Im also not convinced that other states are doing a significantly better job than NSW, there has been a huge degree of luck.

I don't think it's a question as to whether other states are doing a better job as much as a question of intent. If NSW has the intent to suppress and every other state has the intent to eliminate in the community, then there's a clear difference in determining what success looks like. The other states will not open to NSW whilst that misalignment exists. It doesn't matter whether the federal government has said that suppression is the strategy or not. Every state government bar NSW has seen how quickly suppression can fail and is now more adamant than ever around elimination. And the relevant state populations overwhelmingly endorse it.

But having said that, I do think there are some things that certain states are doing better. Qld appear to be doing a lot better at ensuring self-isolation is happening. Police checks on those isolating are much, much more frequent than in NSW, both now and during the initial outbreak in March/April. Compliance with self-isolation is much higher - almost certainly because police checks are more frequent. I have no doubt that this degree of proactivity by the state is contributing to outcomes. I'm not suggesting Qld can't have a serious outbreak - it absolutely can - but there are some controls in place that can help mitigate that aren't necessarily there for NSW. And that may be due to the difference in intent.

A researcher today was calling for mandatory vaccination once available, even if 100% of Australians get vaccinated (knowing that isnt possible die to some medical conditions) - it still wont mean zero cases. Vaccination isnt a guarantee you wont catch Covid.

The pragmatists in me, just cant see anyone being able to guarantee no cases, unless its eliminated world wide. If NSW gets to zero community transmission for whatever period the other states demand, and then there is another case slamming the borders shut again with short notice, NSW residents will just write off those states as no go zones.

I don't think anyone thinks that they have to guarantee zero cases. No one can do that. But I think they're expecting other state governments to demonstrate that their strategy for virus control actually works, and more importantly, can coexist with their own strategy. Qld didn't shut its borders to NSW when cases started to emerge - the borders closed when it became clear that NSW response wasn't sufficient to quickly break the chains. Same with SA's response to NSW.

What we've seen in NSW is exactly what was promised under a suppression strategy. You'd see an outbreak occurring, it'd be small and would be contained and squashed back to nothing. Whilst the Victorian outbreak came from a blindspot, the Crossroads outbreak was almost the archetype example of what might occur in suppression and it came with the promise that it could be controlled without launching spot fires all over the place. That doesn't seem to have played out.

I think the most obvious example in the last few weeks came from comparing SA to NSW. SA went hard when it saw a couple of cases and once again tightened restrictions significantly on venues that could cause spread. NSW asked people politely not to socialise as much. That's as clear cut a demonstration of intent as you could find.

 

[SydneySwan]

NT going to stay closed for 18mths?

NT border policed for at least 18 months, closed to VIC indefinitely

Northern Territory Chief Minister Michael Gunner has revealed he will keep the Territory’s border guarded for at least another 18 months from Tuesday and recruit extra police to keep the barriers in place.

www.news.com.au

He had better not go cap in hand to the Feds to fund the extra police, etc. he needs to keep us out.

 

[jakeseven7]

NT going to stay closed for 18mths?

NT border policed for at least 18 months, closed to VIC indefinitely

Northern Territory Chief Minister Michael Gunner has revealed he will keep the Territory’s border guarded for at least another 18 months from Tuesday and recruit extra police to keep the barriers in place.

www.news.com.au

Please, its election time in the NT too.... its vomit worthy - NT, QLD, WA the cough coming out of their mouths.

Plus to be a little fair to old mate whoever he is in the NT, the media have taken his quote slightly out of context to get people CLICKING!

 

[Hvr]

They're all expected to face questions about their knowledge and handling of the hotel quarantine system.

I hope the Commission asks the Chief Commissioner of Police to explain why he didn't want the ADF involved at that time.

 

[Lynda2475]

Police checks on those isolating are much, much more frequent than in NSW, both now and during the initial outbreak in March/April.

Curious as to where you read this? Unlike Victoria where police checks (which started much later than other states) have have continued to indicate very poor compliance in some areas, I have read nothing of the sort wrt NSW.

 

[Lynda2475]

any don’t believe NSW have built an appropriate level of PPE to mandate such a change on masks yet unfortunately. The government has been dodging answering this question so I suspect they are busy building up stocks then will make a call.

NSW Govt has said they do have adequate amounts of PPE.

Unlike at the start of the pandemic, surgical masks are readily available in chemists, dollar shops and even Coles supermarkets, and the price gouging seems to have settled. My Dad picked up a box of 50 surgical masks at his local newsagent for $30 (so 60 cents a mask is pretty economical), whereas back in April people were charging over $110 for a box. In my area I've seen heaps of people wearing N95 masks, but they run about $4.50 each.

 

[drron]

Sometimes Twitter is a source for good.mike Baird former NSW Premier sticking up for Dan Andrews.He ended with a quote from Teddy Roosevelt.

"It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood… who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat."

 

[HappyFlyerFamily]

Courtesy of ABC Covid live blog


Who made the decision to use private security guards in the hotel quarantine program?

Daniel Andrews is answering this right now.

He said the National Cabinet decided on a hotel quarantine system on March 27.

Then the Victorian crisis council approved a set of arrangements and that were implemented and "delivered by officials and others at a very local level".

"Our crisis council of Cabinet funded and endorsed a program. The program is then delivered at a local level by a big team, a team that was able to I think provide support and quarantine for in excess of 20,000 people," Mr Andrews said.

"The exact nature of security arrangements, their adequacy or otherwise, that is appropriately a matter for the judge to look at.

"I don't believe ADF support was on offer. It's been provided in limited circumstances in New South Wales, not to provide security as such but to provide transportation from the airport to hotels. I think it is fundamentally incorrect to assert that there was hundreds of ADF staff on offer and somehow someone said no. That's not, in my judgement, accurate.

"There was a proposal drawn up. [Using private security guards] was essentially already operating, at some significant scale, but would need it go to another level. It was running quarantine and support services for a range of different people, whether it be health workers, vulnerable Victorians, women and children fleeing family violence. The best answer I can give you is that this hotel quarantine model … had worked well in those cohorts. It was simply limited to include the return travellers and it was stood up within the time frame.

"It was essentially an extension of a program that we had already stood up. Nothing more, nothing less."

 

[HappyFlyerFamily]

I hope the Commission asks the Chief Commissioner of Police to explain why he didn't want the ADF involved at that time.

Just to clear. Today is the Parliamentary Committee. The Judicial Commission is separate.

 

[Gremlin]

Curious as to where you read this? Unlike Victoria where police checks (which started much later than other states) have have continued to indicate very poor compliance in some areas, I have read nothing of the sort wrt NSW.

Sorry, I don't have anything I can share that's in the public domain, but consider this...

If you have 1,000 people self-isolating and you selectively check 100 of them once at some point over the two week period and 2 aren't there on the occasion that you check, then your politicians can claim a 98% compliance rate.

If you have 100 people self-isolating and you check every single one of them every day, sometimes multiple times a day and 98 are there every single time and 2 are there every single time bar one, you also have a 98% compliance rate.

Are these two scenarios equivalent? Which one suggests more risk of community transmission?

 

[Lynda2475]

My understanding is all those in self isolation are door-knocked at least once during the 14 day window - its not perfect but nothing to suggest that Queenslanders are more compliant with directive to stay home that those in NSW.