Predictions of when international flights may resume/bans lifted

just doing a quick check, arrival caps were introduced on July 13... UK wasn't in the category of total lockdown before then like some cases in South America? So travel should have been possible between March and July?

There are confusing messages too... there are some very genuine cases that appear to be mixed up in the hyperbole of cases that seem less urgent? The mother, who is with her husband, living and working happily in the UK, but 'gut-wrenching' mental health issues driven by putting away new-born clothes and replacing them with three-month clothes?
So much does not add up about the growing backlog, especially the habit of all articles being pretty much about Anglo-Saxons in the UK.

From the last DFAT detailed break-ups - the number of people 'registered' from the UK wanting to return to Australia ranked 7th largest. The top 4 don't seem to have changed with them being India, The Phillipines, South Africa & Vietnam.
 
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So much does not add up about the growing backlog, especially the habit of all articles being pretty much about Anglo-Saxons in the UK.

From the last DFAT detailed break-ups - the number of people 'registered' from the UK wanting to return to Australia ranked 7th largest. The top 4 don't seem to have changed with them being India, The Phillipines, South Africa & Vietnam.

Agreed it doesn’t add up, the non registered numbers are estimated to be 100,000+ - not the 35,700 which is the only number the government uses to down play the issue at hand.

But even the 35k number has gone up almost 10,000 over the last couple of weeks.
 
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I'll throw my hat into the ring:

These are across the board.

Absolute best case scenario: Early June 2020
Mid case scenario: Early September 2020
Worst case scenario: Early December 2020

Zombie apocalypse, glad you hoarded toilet paper and pasta: June 2021

Only mention toilet paper and pasta because I came out of 14 days isolation today and are still unavailable. Fresh food which I craved was in plentiful supply :)

Zombie apocalypse June 2021 would really be on the sunny side right now. Maybe NZ by then. Elsewhere end of 2021 would be possibility.
 
There are confusing messages too... there are some very genuine cases that appear to be mixed up in the hyperbole of cases that seem less urgent? The mother, who is with her husband, living and working happily in the UK, but 'gut-wrenching' mental health issues driven by putting away new-born clothes and replacing them with three-month clothes?

Hands up everyone who wants MEL_Traveller to be the arbiter of mental health issues?
 
Hands up everyone who wants MEL_Traveller to be the arbiter of mental health issues?

i think @MEL_Traveller was referring to a number of cases in that article where the Aussies “desperate” to get to Australia really only wanted to visit/holiday.

Not people who actually have no job, no prospects and need to escape the UK and return to their country of birth.

The post you quoted referred to mental health issues from a young mother not being able to take her newborn to visit extended family. If you emigrate to the other side of the planet, you need to accept that your family won’t be able to drop in everyday.

I’m with @MEL_Traveller, there’s fair bit of hyperbole/drama in some of those cases.
 
you emigrate to the other side of the planet, you need to accept that your family won’t be able to drop in everyday.

And that last statement itself is hyperbole.

People travel overseas from family in the knowledge that in today's world family members can reach each other in at most, 30 hours.
 
I’m with @MEL_Traveller, there’s fair bit of hyperbole/drama in some of those cases.

No. There may be some hyperbole/drama in the way these cases are reported. How is that the ‘cases’ fault?

Who are we to sit back and judge these people's circumstances, how could we possibly know what they are going through?

At the end of the day we have tens of thousands of Australians who want to come home and are not able to.
 
No. There may be some hyperbole/drama in the way these cases are reported. How is that the ‘cases’ fault?

Who are we to sit back and judge these people's circumstances, how could we possibly know what they are going through?

At the end of the day we have tens of thousands of Australians who want to come home and are not able to.

I don’t think I was assigning blame or fault. More just rebutting the attack on @MEL_Traveller, as I agreed ... some of those stories seemed a bit dramatised.

For the record, I am against the caps preventing citizens returning home.

But i’m also against everything being an end of the world calamity.

I am a single person living alone in Victoria .... so i kinda feel like i have some perspective to what isolation and limits on personal freedoms feels like. :p That said you’re right, I can’t tell people how to feel.

Now i’m going to try to think up a legal reason for me to walk past my front gate.🤣
 
And that last statement itself is hyperbole.

People travel overseas from family in the knowledge that in today's world family members can reach each other in at most, 30 hours.

The way I look at is what happens if you get an awful call that means you should drop everything and come back (has happened twice to me in 12 years). Accounting for (pre-COVID) schedules, from somewhere like Singapore it is at most 18 hours. Somewhere like London, could be up to 36 hours. Somewhere like New York up to 48 hours. In parts of Africa and South America, could be several more days, but certainly no more than 5 days.

At the moment, from anywhere, it's at least 15 days, and could be months ...
 
Throwing caution to the wind (but with the knowledge it's a free cancellation until January 2021) I just booked two award seats on CX to London for mid July next year. Son leaves for UK Thursday week so figured why not.

Great, we'll book in that drink then! I'll take you to a COVID-19 friendly bar in COVIDville 😉
 
And I can't see it happening until Australia is fully open domestically.

Otherwise we run the risk of having NZ determine out domestic policy.
Ie. Relax the Victorian border, and we will stop flights to NZ.
 
And I can't see it happening until Australia is fully open domestically.

Otherwise we run the risk of having NZ determine out domestic policy.
Ie. Relax the Victorian border, and we will stop flights to NZ.
I suspect that a deal has been done to take NSW methodology for hotspots and contact tracing as the benchmark.

NZ is now becoming more pragmatic and the risk from NSW is very very low. One thing you will not see is AKL to BNE or PER while those states deny Australians entry. They’ll start with SYD and other states will have to align to that benchmark.
 
I suspect that a deal has been done to take NSW methodology for hotspots and contact tracing as the benchmark.

NZ is now becoming more pragmatic and the risk from NSW is very very low. One thing you will not see is AKL to BNE or PER while those states deny Australians entry. They’ll start with SYD and other states will have to align to that benchmark.

I think that’s what the Feds said didn’t they, that states won’t get international flights until they have domestic borders open.

So QLD definitely no game.

I wonder if WA will get a ‘special disadvantaged’ pass though? (On account of their weaker health system/resources)
 
I think that’s what the Feds said didn’t they, that states won’t get international flights until they have domestic borders open.

So QLD definitely no game.

I wonder if WA will get a ‘special disadvantaged’ pass though? (On account of their weaker health system/resources)
Nope. If you don’t agree to the Commonwealth definition of a hotspot then you stay closed to international.

WA has the funding capacity to have a strong healthcare system and has built the Fiona Stanley hospital recently as well as expanding ICU capacity by 200 beds; but the state is so vast that ED capacity up north would be limited in line with population. Like most major medical incidents aeromedical evacuation to Perth would be required.
 
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