Travel bubbles are coming:
Tasmania’s premier is looking at opening up travel between WA, SA, NT, and possibly New Zealand.
If the selective borders do open, it won’t be popular with the two biggest states which still have outbreaks. (Queensland has only had four new cases in the last week, but NSW has 23 and Victoria 50+. Indignant commenters at The Australian talked of High Court Challenges using s117. BUt I can’t see anyone rushing to fund those.
Coronavirus: Apple Isle’s selective reopening would shut out tourists from ‘sick’ states
Mathew Denholm ,The Australian
Some Australians craving a long-promised Tasmanian getaway may have to wait longer than others, with the holiday isle’s Premier considering a selective border relaxation favouring states most on top of COVID-19.
Options included restoring direct flights to cities in jurisdictions that had the virus under control, such as Adelaide and Perth, or even New Zealand. This would avoid the need for tourists to travel via Sydney or Melbourne, cities still experiencing multiple new daily coronavirus cases.
A few days ago three Baltic States opened borders with each other.
On May 15 Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia decided their Coronavirus situation was good enough that they could afford to reopen amongst themselves. But anyone else flying in would need to be quarantined for 2 weeks. I hope Latvia’s numbers are low enough.
It’s a start.
Makes a farce of we’re all in this together. I thought the app was about managing the virus so life could be normal. There is a major disconnect between the states Premiers and the federal government.Even in Victoria there has not been any suggestion or likelihood that the Macdonalds cluster or the Cedar meats clusters are going to lead to any deaths largely because they have ( after stuffing up originally ) been managed. With the app combined with close protection of scrutiny of vulnerable places such as nursing homes, retirement homes and hospitals means that we can manage the spread whilst minimising deaths. Deaths not active cases is all that matters when opening up the economy and the sooner the states realise that the better.
165
G’day Z,
I suggest the app is not such a great game changer, based on the estimate that half of the nation’s smart phones are iPhones which don’t seem to be very friendly to the app. Nor have I seen any estimate of how many of those phones are sufficiently up to date to even start to use it.
Cheers
Dave B
120
Our mobiles are monitored by the security forces, (5 eyes), in any case. The app actually provides far less information. However, its the first time we have been asked to reduce our privacy.
52
Zig, For Border policy — it’s not the deaths than matter, its the new daily cases. From Tasmanias point of view, the concern with delivery truck McDonalds drivers is not about the Victorian death toll climbing by 1 or 2. It’s that his friends might seed an unseen spread in Tasmania which means two hospitals have to be shut down, and 5000 people have to be put back into lockdown.
Think about it from the state importing the tourists — if 500 people died a month ago, but there has been zero new cases for three weeks, that makes it much safer for Tasmania than if only 100 people died a month ago, but there have been 50 new cases in the last week.
51
If I read this correctly we can no longer live as before without a vaccine?
If we get a vaccine is everyone going to be “encouraged” to take it?
Can we try it out on ALL proponents of the vaccine first?
If they don’t have detrimental effects say after 12 months others may be willing.
It is not as if too many people are dying from CV-19.
101
Deaths currently number 311,847.
When is enough enough, Geoff?
48
Put you down for the first vaccine volunteer.
61
57 million people around the world die EVERY year
That’s over 1.1 million a week.
We are all mortal
Most of the deaths are in the over 60s and generally have other morbid conditions or poor immune systems
In the same time these 311000 have died, over 10 million have died from other causes
Of the 311000 who have died, corona virus may have been in their system but may NOT have been the primary cause of death
121
An enforced vaccine could be horrific or a good thing. No-one knows. For Covid-19 it is not yet a viable option. The death rate would need to be proven at VERY high levels before the trade-off became worthwhile.
Picking something and saying it is a good thing to get votes when you have no experience making anything is a “Will to Power”. Ego, pride and vanity lead direct to Karl Marx. He explained just how to manipulate the population to get and retain power over them.
“The last capitalist we hang shall be the one who sold us the rope.”
62
Excess deaths, rather than deaths is the more meaningful number. I would be surprised if viewed over an annual period 2020 wont look much different to ther years despite the day by day drama.
93
Wow. Evidence please. I mean real evidence, not the political spin that suits the enemies of the aged and those who have a large amount of financial interest in the game.
May? May not.
Might, could. And all the rest.
That’s how the man-made global warming scientists talk. It’s not science, Mal.
48
Does this qualify as enough evidence to question the numbers?
https://journal-neo.org/2020/05/11/coronavirus-and-dodgy-death-numbers/
51
Joseph, No it is not. Just another opinion leader with an ideology to push
310
LOL you guys … in the US hospitals get paid more money if the patient has CCP virus, They get paid a lot more if they put them on a ventilator. I don’t even need to see the evidence from the USA to know what the result will be. The stats are dodgy AF. Oh, and remember the arbitrary home deaths that were suddenly added to the NY total, as “likely to have died from CCP virus?” C’mon already…
72
deaths arent important but toggle back to that to show whats important?
21
Jo, the idea of turning the world into a level 4 bio-hazard laboratory is breathtaking in its naivete. Time to back off and look at plan B.
53
Zig,
It’s called being flexible as the circumstances change. Rather than have aa pre- set plan which is a straight jacket.
Here in SA the Aged care centers have reopened to famiily visitors in a limited way.
We do not want to import the disease from anywhere
And that includes Vic. NSW & Qld.
612
How many ordinary readers are sick to back teeth of crap comments with no science but full of self important nonsense about rights ?
I am completely sick of this rubbish contaminating this science blog.
There are lots of other ‘my rights’ blogs to sound off about such tripe. Or even Facebook for god’s sake.
Please let this blog be about science & let Jo get on with leading us in the search for Science based knowledge & understanding.
And now that I have p##ssed off all those folks, here is an ABC report about COVID 19 : It is THREE DIFFERENT DISEASES :
https://www.abc.net.au/news/health/2020-05-19/coronavirus-doctor-ny-says-covid-like-multiple-diseases/12242026
Golly I expecting dozens of red thumbs for this guys . Don’t let me down.
🙂
[REd Thumb from me Bill. I’ve only just seen this. And it is not ok to call for moderation at #1 on the thread. You are also trying to stop discussion. Call for better comments. Never call to close people down. -0 jo]
314
refer to #1.3.2
[I’ve taken these out. Off topic at #1. And Asked Bill not to do that. Freedom of speech! – Jo]
01
What? No! Deaths don’t give others covid-19, but active cases moving around between states sure will, and that’s why open travel bubbles, and borders and restrictions are logical and fully necessary.
104
WA’s Premier is not opening borders to anyone because he is power tripping. We have less than a handful of active cases and that is pretty much representative of the country’s rate of infection. But McGowab wants the borders closed for months…
Independent Man echoed my feelings on the matter exactly today:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cBjokjvAOGU&t=0s
This is not a one dimensional (i.e. lock down to save every last life) problem like many here seem to think. Once again, 40 people die every day in WA alone on average. We have lost 9 to CCP virus. Nine…. Time to say nein to lock down in WA.
For the record, even non-essential civil servants in the state were going to work during the “lock down.” Rules for thee…
51
The b was a genuine typo.
01
Bulldust I gather you would not have minded if 99 people died of Covid 19 in WA,
Instead of just 9.
But fact is that the government took heed of the science and did two things:
1 : Quarantined WA from the world & the rest of Australia
2: Locked down almost all the residents..
And voila ! The disease was stopped in it’s tracks…Just some cleaning up and double checking to do now and it’s all over..
And you are unhappy I guess about that result….
I suggest that says more about you than the government’s strategy.
05
Given I never said that, you are waaaay off the mark Bill. I accepted the lock down because we were dealing with an unknown. Now that the virus is under control in Oz, it’s time to get things cranked up and quickly. This timid baby step reopening is causing much economic damage, and I bet, plenty of deaths from despair.
Try arguing points I have made, not straw men you made up in your head. I didn’t even red thumb you, that’s other folks BTW. Like I said previously, I rarely red thumb anyone.
20
Glad to see you have clarified things changed your mind Bulldust.
PS I didn’t give you a red’un.
03
Still no data on the ‘second wave’ from Spain, Italy and Germany who eased their lockdowns 3 weeks ago with 1000+ cases a day. It’s as mysterious as the supposed thousands of undetected cases in our local community. Still waiting for the “worst is yet to come” that Qld’s Premier was claiming 3 weeks ago. But … Iran.
[Please stay on topic ]AD
52
They are thinking it may behave like the Spanish influenza pandemic and become reactivated in the Northern hemisphere ‘fall’.
https://www.businessinsider.com.au/europe-prepare-second-deadly-coronavirus-wave-fall-who-2020-5
There is no reason to suspect that Australia will experience a second wave as we head into winter.
33
Let’s wait and see if it ‘deactivates‘ at any point prior to their fall though. I bet it doesn’t as I see no evidence within the global data which indicates it “deactivates” in hotter weather. That’s a theoretical pipe-dream, the data shows exactly the opposite is occurring (but no one ever listens, they all think they know better than the data for some reason!).
The data reveals COVID-19’s contagiousness is amplified in hotter weather.
This is not a theory, OK? That’s confirmed by the data!
How then? What’s the mechanism that does that? I’m glad you asked, it’s very easy to understand.
I love this supposed ‘logic’ of the thesis that fluid micro-droplets can’t survive as long in Summer. That is patent garbage. This is a level of nonsense that only a person from a subtropical climate city would come up with, or would fall for. It seems most southerners within Australia also fall for this garbage very easily as well, but it’s very obviously physically and logically incorrect. And most likely never been sufficiently tested.
Jut another myth/meme to discard.
Someone who lives in the tropics will quickly realize that such micro-droplets are likely to last significantly longer in the Tropics in Summer, than in Melbourne during Winter. Why do you southern types think the tropics get sweaty, and also quite rainy during Summer???
It’s because the evaporative potential is low during Summer, thus evaporative cooling doesn’t occur fast enough, no matter how much you sweat. This is because relative-humidity is so high most of the day that the air’s much too close to saturation to absorb more water-based fluid. The air want’s to instead release water via condensation, and thus it rains a lot in Summer.
So, if SARS-CoV-2 it’s airborne in fluid droplets in the Tropics during Summer, then of course those droplets are going to last a lot longer, indoors in Brazil during Summer, than indoors at a Stockholm Mall in Winter!
How obvious is that?
And thus COVID-19 will be more contagious if the droplets are released indoors in Singapore in ‘Summer’ (when isn’t it?), and thus is sheltered indoors from strong UV, and/or floats about under humid thick vegetation canopy for hours. Humans will always tend to be in the shaded areas as well where any micro-droplets have been released and refuse to evaporate.
Whereas, in the colder weather countries the air is almost always relatively drier and any droplets released are more likely to evaporate sooner within the drier air, no matter what the temperature inside is.
This simple reality alone neatly explains how COVID-19 in micro-droplets can be significantly more contagious indoors within Singapore, than indoors within Stockholm.
Yet no matter how many times I’ve pointed this simple relationship out to southerners (who apparently religiously accept the faith that micro-droplets will always last longer in colder conditions) they can’t ever seem their get their heads around the fact that the meme they believe is the opposite of what would actually occur in the topics in Summer.
So I’m not the slightest bit surprised that the data shows COVID-19 spreads more easily in a workers barracks in Singapore, than it does in a shopping center in Stockholm, during Winter.
So anyone expecting COVID-18 to “deactivate” in Summer is in for a rude shock.
And no matter if I point that out until I’m blue in the face, the believers in the accepted meme will discount this, and totally ignore what the data shows to be true, and they will continue to assert that only the opposite of what the data shows is acceptable in polite company, because the accepted meme must not be questioned, and heretic’s should be humored, but not too much.
By the way, all stomach ulcers are caused by too much stress, and the drinking of overly hot fluids too often.
It’s the truth!
31
WX, influenza gets protection from humiidty over 24C but the opposite in temps below that.
There’s a crossover so that influenza particles last longer in cold and dry conditions and in warm and humid conditions.
I can dig out that paper if you like…
So use the air con to dry the air on a hot day and buy a humidifier for winter. I don’t know if coronavirus is the same. But hot dry weather could wreck the virus in OZ, at the same time as hot moist air helps it in Singapore and Brazil.
30
Thanks Jo, I’ve been thinking the effect would be the most effective in maritime and coastal areas like SEA, and coastal E QLD, where the air is onshore in the late afternoon, and the daily rh variability is the least and shortest, i.e. diurnal low rh is in late afternoon but basically no other time in NQ. And this ‘low’ rh the period is not that low either, and immediately followed by near saturation by 8:30 PM. Coastal is where the population lives, so my guess was/is that COVID-19 never became established enough before the soft ‘lockdown’ home isolations quenched it, and the effect of any higher propensity to spread here was quickly negated.
I’ll look up that paper.
31
So… Discussion related to Tasmania still being concerned about ‘First Wave’ transmission is allowed, however raising questions about the existence or not of the so called ‘Second Wave’ is not.
So, as part of The Conversation we are having here, as we to assume that the ‘Second Wave’ will have no affect on intranational tourism and associated state to state travel?
20
I think we are allowed to offer support for the ‘second wave’ theory but are not allowed to question it. So I say Tasmania should look at Iran for guidance.
11
If you can rely on the undercover newsagents there strategically placed in Iran/Persia.
01
In Communist countries, internal travel is tightly controlled and use of “travel pssports” required.
So once again we see the imposition
142
Sorry….not sure what happened….
So once again we see imposition of internal travel restrictions just like in communist countries. Ok, for how long?
My concern is freedoms -the corona virus thing can be used to jerk us aound at the whim of govts who could be shut things down with “evidence” we cant see. Then add a “safety” app on thier phone everyone needs to have, and you have a communist style “internal pssport” in operation.
We need to push govts hard to ensure this doesnt drag on more than a few months. Virus or no virus, we are in a precarioys tone for freedoms. Govts have a tendency to take fredoms and not return them…..
242
‘Govts have a tendency to take freedoms and not return them…..’
That is a gross generalisation, the Tasmanian government will return to normal once they feel safe from the mainlanders. Talking to a Hobart nurse yesterday and she gave me the impression that there is this fear of asymptomatic carriers, both at home and abroad.
915
History tells me my “geberalization” is correct.
114
Not in a democracy, apples and pears.
410
yes Steve the level of govt control via regulation or taxation is no more now than back in the 1960s because democracy. You only have to buld and house, start a business or buy a firearm to see that. Australia, land of the free.
92
Yes and my general comment is that we need to be vigilant right now, regards freedoms and our democracy. Its too easy for complacency to rule and the frog in the pot if water scenario applies.
The biggest threat as I see it is that govts will be “advised” ( usually by our own “swamp” ) to take a course of action that benefits the globalist agenda of maintaing a restrictive lockdown and curbing or removal of freedoms, then that is what they will pursue with bloody determination. You dont mess with these guys, our main defence is keeping a spotlight on them and pressuring govts to not be thier bag boys.
If you sit back and listen to the language govt us using, its super ckear they will reluctantly give all feeedoms back. Thst should be a huge red flag right there. The plan seems yo be to use tge fog of war to implement a china-style restriction of movement and forcing everyone to carry a govt mandated app on thier phones.
I warned about this a while ago and no one believed me…
Vigilance is required or we will lose our democracy.
193
Steve.
Ignore that comment below.
You’re talking about the abuse and perversion of science for the purposes of control and financial gain.
That is relevant to the accuracy and validity of The Science being presented every day to a largely scientifically unaware population.
We can’t have legitimate science without scrutiny and the abuse of trust in science is clear in both the global warming and CV19 experiences. Clear to scientists but hidden from the public.
42
Off Topic. Why aren’t these being removed.. ?
112
MYOB.
Please remove.
32
Bill complaining about others being off topic, ahh thats funny.
92
el gordo you are so naive. History proves OriginalSteve is right on the money. The only difference this time around is it’s much easier for governments to control us using technological advancements. A case in point is the 9/11 event. International travelling changed forever as a result. Drones are already being deployed. Eventually robots will be roaming around. If you think government controls are not increasing and freedoms will be returned to us as they were, you are dreaming.
213
“Eventually robots will be roaming around.”
China has already started this practice:
Autonomous Robots aid in patrolling and disinfecting COVID-19 hit China
https://www.geospatialworld.net/blogs/autonomous-robots-aid-in-patrolling-and-disinfecting-covid-19-hit-china/
40
The French stopped drone surveillance through the power of the legal system and we would do the same.
In a democracy governments are thrown out if they take away people’s freedom, we are not yet under the boot of the Beijing fascists.
72
Also off topic. Please remove.
013
so sayeth Bill, you not a retired and frustrated school headmaster are ya Bill?
112
O S I thought this was a science blog Steve.
When your freedoms kills or makes other sick, it’s normal that we restrict your freedom..
Just a natural consequence of living in a community ….
But maybe you don’t ?
In which event you still have all your freedoms.
316
Bill,
Do you not think the restriction of our freedoms in this instance are of a very different hue?
73
No…It’s pandemic
The last one was in 1918-9.
211
Hush, hush, don’t mention the Spanish Flu of 1918-19
It will create bright red mental conniptions in the minds of some folks here.
And lead to censorship.
Galileo, Da Vinci, Halley, Hooke, Mendelvev, Darwin, Einstein & Turing all wept.
15
Almost unbelievable.
11
[Off Topic]AD
11
Excess mortality stats from euromomo: https://www.euromomo.eu/graphs-and-maps/
Conclusions:
1. Zero excess at ages younger than 15. (Open the schools.)
2. Marginal excess in ages 15 -64. (Get back to work, get on with life, open the borders and cease this panicked lockdown now held in place by the timidity of the elected)
3. Excess appears at ages 65 and over – instead of around 60,000 deaths per week normally at this time of year, it’s up to 65,000 per week, adjusted owing to data delay. (Protect the elderly.)
161
That’s interesting..
A huge spike is deaths just happened…
20/20 hindsight !
And let’s being completely agist and lock up the elderly for their own good !
213
exactly, it makes far more sense than locking everyone up for their own good
43
I nominate you to be first old timer to be locked up
27
I’ve been watching Euromomo for weeks David. I disagree on 2. the “marginals” — the spike in Age 15 – 64 is as high proportionally as the one in the older groups. Meaning the odds of dying increase at a similar ratio. They may be much less likely to die in an absolute sense, but the risk of dying is still 2x higher than normal with Covid, and in these ages the years lost, and the productivity lost are so much higher.
Lockdown is reducing the deaths in the youngest, but in countries where Covid really flies, there are many excess deaths in everyone over 16. More than the flu.
And if lockdowns save lives for other reasons, the spike is even more due to Covid.
11
Donald Trump seems to be trying to demonstrate that there is something everyone can do to avoid catching the COVID-19 virus. This has been reported today in both SMH and ABC “Just In”, the latter in:
…
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-05-19/donald-trump-hydroxychloroquine-coronavirus-health-warnings/12261652
…
Both articles also mention zinc, but then go on to ignore it.
They also highlight the side effects of hcq, but without mentioning that they are rare.
Another sentence really sets my alarm bells ringing:
” Mr Trump has continued to promote hydroxychloroquine despite little evidence of its efficacy for prevention or treatment of COVID-19, and warnings from his administration’s top medical professionals. ”
Every time I hear “there is no evidence” from a politician, bureaucrat or reporter I think “cover up”, and that certainly applies here. Dr Zelenko’s successes are not mentioned, let alone their high success rate.
…
But both papers have published the story, which means that at least readers can see that President Trump is putting his money where his mouth is, as we say.
And, as I believe will happen, he will not be affected by the virus, people might look more closely at what he’s been doing and follow his lead. That, in my view will change COVID-19 from a pandemic threat to a minor, controllable nuisance, easily managed with tested, proven and generally available medicines and vitamins.
Opening borders and travel. Quickly.
…
Unfortunately it also requires honest and reliable reporting from major, and especially national news agencies.
(I’ve just dashed my own optimism. D)
…
Cheers
Dave B
160
This sort of fake news reporting is no more than we expect from their ABC.
Zelenko, Truong, Raoult and many others have demonstrated the efficacy of HCQ + Zn (with Azithromycin).
http://joannenova.com.au/2020/04/viral-numerology-coronavirus-fades-after-6-to-8-weeks-due-to-magic-or-something/#comment-2314868
The studies that have been quoted as showing questionable efficacy have all been debunked as poor science piled upon poor experimental design. But their ABC can never let a efficacious treatment get in the way of yet another of its anti-Trump diatribes.
70
Ans, I note that President Trump has just announced that he’s been taking HCQ and Zn for the last ten days or so, as a prophylactic.
https://video.foxnews.com/v/6157590563001#sp=show-clips
Now that’ll set the cat amongst the anti-Trump stool pigeons at their ABC and elsewhere.
100
And here’s the real deal. The president of the USA advising that he takes HCQ + Zn.
https://youtu.be/7T8j5UMjPAc
As was posted here a couple of weeks ago, the front line staff in hospitals and medical doctors are and have been taking it. Especially in Italy.
So, ABC, now tell us the truth.
70
[Off Topic]AD
11
[Off Topic ] Please realise the enormous amount of work the host puts into these threads and throwing in off topic comments early shows either a lack of respect or that you do not understand the rules.
Please read the “Guide for Commenting” .[AD]
21
Hi AD, as always, please delete any of my comments you consider not fit for the topic.
Cheers
Steve
40
Good as gold,
as long as yous guys don’t start referring to us as E.A. or East Australia. Then again, we’ll keep on referring to you as the West Island as our takeover is almost complete (insert maniacal laughter * here).
BTW, South Island skifields have just received the OK to open next month, albeit on restricted days (school holidays and weekends) to begin with. And there’s a fresh new dusting on the tops as I type, woohoo! I can feel a road trip south comin’ on…
50
AD i have a suggestion….run an open thread side by side with each new topic.
[Jo ?]
41
There are plenty of Open Threads. You just have to wait a few days.
70
Agree…if you have a daily open thread you kill discussion. Not everyone pops on for extended periods each day to inform and debate so an open thread that is the active one for several days makes more sense.
Steve’s request speaks more to his wish for his comment to be near the top. FOMO
83
Make the occasional thread where C-19 comments are not allowed 🙂
[ All good suggestions but can we please go to the last unthreaded and discuss it not here please.]AD
52
A huge part of Queensland that has never had one case of the virus, has been in lockdown the whole time except for council elections on 28 march and 2 weeks prepoll also a football game at the new 25000 seat Townsville stadium which does not make sense. The grey area on the maps in this Qld Health Link have not had a case of the virus so why have they been in lockdown.
https://www.qld.gov.au/health/conditions/health-alerts/coronavirus-covid-19/current-status/statistics#caseoverview
If you run your mouse over the dots on the graph for date and cases.
71
I expect the world to open up faster than most imagine. It will be granular with countries sharing borders looking to see how neighbours have are managing rather than everything back to how it was over night.
There are only a few countries that have not demonstrated an ability to control the virus. Brazil the worst with continuing exponential rise. Mexico and India have a reproduction rate close to 1 but not at or below. In the USA, California and Texas are worth watching as they still have reproduction rate close to 1.
People, widely, are much more alert to symptoms. Who dares to cough in a shop these days, at risk of being expelled. Coughing and spluttering on aircraft, often children, annoyed me when I needed to constantly travel for work. Coughing, sneezing and sputtering without regard for others will become very ant-social behaviour for quite a while.
International air travel will gradually pick up in the coming months. But I expect it will be years before it is back to 2019 levels. Boeing have sacked 16,000 employees as aircraft orders dry up. Civil aircraft are worth USD100bn to the USA in exports so that will hit hard to US and aluminium suppliers. The high purity aircraft aluminium alloy from NZ will take a hit.
Boeing is working on hygiene aspects of aircraft to help encourage people back on. Improved air flow and purification along with UV lighting and virus unfriendly surfaces are among the things being considered. Airlines are looking at ways existing aircraft can be arranged to lower contact between passengers. The incidence of flu may take a serious dive as well!
Makers of the IR forehead temperature scanners are no doubt making a bundle. I expect a boon in infrared scanners with alert functions to be installed where people gather. I noticed schools are scanning children as they arrive each day. Will probably be the norm in workplaces for at least a few months. The metal detectors used at airports and other entry points may include temperature scanners.
So there will be changes in the way people behave as home quarantines are lifted and borders opened. The Herald Sun in Melbourne published a whole list of ‘can do and cannot do’ for AFL players. The cannot do was much longer than the can do.
81
‘Two people in northwest Tasmania who had tested positive to COVID-19 have died, but authorities have stopped short of labelling the virus as the cause. A man and woman, both aged in their 60s, died on Sunday and Monday respectively at the North West Regional Hospital.
‘The pair both had serious pre-existing health conditions, Acting Public Health Director Dr Scott McKeown said in a statement on Monday night.’
9NEWS
30
Establishing a zone where people can fly in and fly out, will I suggest mostly effect FIFO workers.
There are a lot of them working in the export mines who have not been home for 6 weeks or more.
So this will have a significant benefit for those workers and their families.
All good !
And it gives Vic NSW & Qld some incentive to get their numbers down to zero !
38
yeah , because with most of population of Australia, they really havent been trying up till now have they?
51
What is a collective name for this grouping of states, like the Shengen States? FIFO Lands, The Deplorables, The Sheeples, Racoon Lands, Miserables, Wellville, Sanitaria?
41
I think “where?” would cover it!
01
Economically speaking, would it be enough? Both for the airlines, and for tourism in general
If it did happen, what would stop a person from Broken Hill, or Bendigo, taking a flight from Adelaide to Hobart?
That was the case when the US banned bits of Europe, while leaving England open.
14
Peter ,
There are SAPOL police checks at both state border crossing points
Persons entering the state are required to quarantine and provide their SA address details.
SAPOL do call daily at those addresses.
So a no show would quickly be found.
And i doubt that any airline would fly anyone to Tasmania with a Vic home address now.
The airline gets pinged and the traveller is denied entry.
39
So you need proof of identity and proof of residence – and I thought the CCP only did that in China
43
You will not get into SA without both Peter
So I strongly urge you not to try..
We keep a high standard here.
🙂
36
Domestic tourism will take awhile to get up and running, so I’m convinced that outliers from Broken Hill won’t be going to Tasmania any time soon.
10
There are truckloads (well caravans) of Victorian grey nomads who can’t wait for the Qld border to open to escape winter down south.
60
So given that it is the smaller states which want to open up, that would be an economic disaster as they, by themselves, could not provide enough tourists to make it worth while.
Next point, just to travel within that ‘bubble’ (not counting NZ) you would have to prove who you are and where you live. That means, in effect that you need to carry a valid ID at all times, even when walking down to the beach as an example. Not only that, all non tourists would have to carry the same level of ID.
23
Just relax, NSW is opening up tomorrow and they will lead the charge. First in best dressed, but we’ll keep an eye open for clusters.
01
Would all Taswegians please leave Victoria now as you are clearly not part of being in this crisis together. And perhaps Victoria should ban exports of food and other goods so that we can safeguard supplies for Victorians. /sarc
60
Robber the Taswegians have already all gone home mate from Victoria
To reduce their risk of being infected.
Vic Health has done a terrible job.
15
From that map it looks like the Canberra bubble is redefined as a good thing.
20
Henceforth known as the Canberra Bubble.
10
you notice there is a similar sized piece of South Australia underneath the A. Maybe that is still radioactive.
22
Canberra has been ‘bubble’ for over 90 years.
It’s all that collected polly waffle hot air.
It gathers in huge dome over the entire city
16
I reckon the red thumb people will be happy to know that the pollywaffle is due to return to a milk bar near you.
10
Judging from the red’uns GA,
They are looking forward to it.
🙂
02
Until the country has had three weeks of 0 new infections and the hospitals are cleared out, there is still live virus. Remember this loss of 300,000 people started with one. It only takes one.
Conversely when Australia is clear of the virus, we can party. However because people are arriving every day, some with the virus, we have to keep a measure of geographic isolation. As few people have been infected, an antibody test would be a waste of time. A good virus test at airports would be little cost, if it was fast enough.
As for people’s ‘rights’. The right to life is paramount. The right to party, to golf, to crowd at the beach, to crowded restaurants and pubs, to international travel and even domestic travel is by far secondary to the right to life. And anyone who flouts those rules puts everyone else at risk. Or they can go live somewhere else except no one would have them.
No one is in jail. No one is in solitary. People are not starving. There are no soup kitchens. It’s not a dictatorship with fascist or communist leaders and camps and gulags. And 95% of all of this is self imposed with just guidance from the government.
Police intervention is for the 5% who think their ‘rights’ transcend the rights of everyone else. Which is why we have police in the first place. To keep us safe.
57
Total cases for Australia today, nine. Of which 7 are in Victoria and 2 in NSW.
Cedar Meats in Melbourne has caused this delay. There should be an explanation as to why everyone was not tested and the abattoir shut down when the first worker was detected. It looks like the owner had political influence and even doubled production. Three weeks later it was found again by accident when a worker lost a finger, but should never have happened. And it was new before anyone could stop that.
Many more connected with the Cedar Meats would have been tested immediately if the truth was out, but even when it was announced, the government kept the company name a secret. Why? Neither the nurse who treated the injured man nor the man himself had any idea. The 60 year old nurse is now infected. How did that happen? Why?
Like the Ruby Princess, it looks like the work of politicians. Like the Ruby Princess, it should be investigated as criminal, not plausible mistake. We understand that people do not want their businesses shut or the nuisance or cost, but a phone call to your political friends in high places should not give you business immunity at the cost of the lives of others.
85
Hands up all those embarrassed by the Victorian government’s instantaneous rigid adherence to the views of Xi Jinping on what is to be done about covid19. I wonder how easy it is to cancel the BRI concordat, and when we’ll find out…
40
I and many others totally agree with Daniel Andrew’s elimination approach. It has nothing to do with the Chinese Communist Party except that they created and released this deadly virus. And we have nearly succeeded. Then you can play golf.
15
I’ve no issue with Andrews’s lockdown policy per se but find it alarming that post BRI a militant pro Beijing attitude obtains.
20
Pallas is an utter fool and Chinese stooge. He is doing the deep kow tow to Yi JinPing. and his CCP mates.
The odd thing is that Victoria does not grow much of the malting barley sold to China. It’s grown in SA to make make beer which the Chinese love. So I fully expect the Chinese workers to revolt against the CCP as soon as the beer runs out.
( Now that would make a nice dream ..;-)
15
As projected in mid-April, India has passed 100,000 cases today (~4 days later than expected):
INDIA
Total = 100,328
Active = 57,939
New = 4,630
Spreading = 8.0 % each day
Died = 3.15 %
It took from March 2nd to now (78 days), for India to get to 100,000 total cases but with the observed multiplication average during the past 7 days, India reaches just over 200,000 cases in another 13 days (1st of June). So India, like Brazil and Russia, is now also in a rapid growth of totals period, which is currently on track reach 930,000 on the first day of July.
AFRICA
As a continent Africa will reach 100,000 cases within 3 days (as was projected ~1 month ago). The African growth rate is also around +7.5 to +8.0 % on most days, so is on a very similar growth path as India, at present.
India and the African continent should both reach and pass 1 million cases during the first week of July, with both on track for about 4 million to 4.5 million cases by the end of July (in ~7 weeks) if they can not reduce the growth of the active cases.
—
When numbers are this big it’s appropriate and essential to project the observed average growth rates forwards to see approximately what they produce, and approximately when. I don’t apologize for remarking on what these growth trends lead to, as only a fool would claim these trends don’t matter. What I do find disgusting is the small minority of fools who keep say it’s nothing, or a conspiracy, etc., when at 580 cases, on Jan 22nd, or at 50,000 cases, during early February. And which people continue to say it’s nothing significant as we pass the 5 million cases level on May 22nd (in 3 days). And that level of growth is after a global lockdown which very effectively reduced the spread rate from 1.141% growth of new cases on March 22nd, to just 1.02% now as we pass the 5 million cases level.
Globally we’re close to being able to push it below 1, and shrink it out of existence. But some fools are arguing to do the exact opposite and allow it to expand again — which is quite clearly insane.
It illustrates that there’s no upper numbers, or spreading rate at which that wicked minority will take an honest look at the still accelerating spread, and at the absolute nonsense they’re pushing to dismiss the disease as nothing, nor at their abhorrent positions, and what the use of their education and mind has come to.
Such foolish behavior is anything but proper use of a higher education, nor the processing of a clear, sane and rational reasoning mind. And the ‘rationalizing away’ of the current situation plus their incessant pathological excuse-making for why it’s all OK if people die in very large numbers, from a preventable disease is coming across to me as the worthless products of empty hearts and broken minds.
I’m very glad no such people are in positions to enact their preferred approaches within Australia, as you’d surely be the worst sort of despotic, authoritarian conscienceless homicidal-maniacs.
COVID-19 needs to be eliminated in every country, right now, because any country where it’s being permitted to grow, social, political and economic damage will grow along with it and mass-deaths and ungovernable chaos within increasingly failed-states will be a product of it ripping through countries. Many countries may recover from that, but many already marginal countries sure won’t. But that’s OK, they were just poor people (this will soon be the next excuse).
Every time we get a failed-state it produces a minimum of a decade of human misery and violence, often two or more decades of human misery. What if COVID-19 produces 20 new failed-states between now and 2022? Or even 40 new failed-states by 2025? The fools will still be arguing that this was all worth it, that’s what they do.
Does anyone believe a world where that happens will be a world at peace? War and failed states don’t always coincide, just almost always.
COVID-19 can and will destroy whole countries, it can not be permitted to run amok in the world. And nor should we allow a minority of complete fools to get way with their ‘rationalizing’ vacuous ‘arguments’ for allowing that to happen and destroying the peace and prosperity of the world, and its economy, for decades to come.
This is one of the historic forks in the road for humanity, where all that’s needed for wickedness to get its way is for good people to do nothing, and allow it to just happen. We can’t eliminate COVID-19 from earth, but we certainly can manage it to the point of making it ineffective and its damage negligible.
We’ve already proven there’s no inevitability at all to COVID-19’s spread — Italy is proving this to the world right now! Do we really need to run this hellish experiment everywhere? Only a fool would do that!
If you try to live alongside COVID-19 you’re not going to have a stable growing economy, because families will not martyr themselves to save an economy or a business — even if they say they dearly want to. When the reality of COVID-19’s rapid spread is staring them in the face, they’ll unavoidably take the path of least risk, to obtain their family’s daily needs. Bravado and the delusions of fools will not make the economy grow, as COVID-19 grows.
If you want the economy to grow then stop growing COVID-19, and economic growth will. There’s no “living with it”, only a fool would imaging that’s an option in our modern cities.
We need many more examples of what Italy, Hong Kong, Australia and Taiwan have done to defeat it, and far fewer examples of countries like USA, Sweden, Brazil, Peru and Russia.
I projected mid-April the world’s 4th most populous country, Indonesia, should reach 100,000 cases in the last week of May, with the then observed spreading rate, I also said at the time that they were in a position to still beat it. And they’ve managed to hold it down to ~18,000 total cases today, with ~12,500 actives, and ~500 new cases. They haven’t beaten it yet but it hasn’t beaten them either, they can still eliminate it from here, without hitting the big numbers first.
If Indonesia’s cities can hold it down, and Hong Kong can eliminate it, then any city anywhere can eliminate COVID-19 and keep it out, or suppressed fast.
There’s no excuse for letting COVID-19 run amok all over the world, and governments that allow that to happen from here need to be held to account for it. And nor is there any excuse for ever letting it get out of China.
But it does blow my mind that people who are angry at the CCP for letting it out also propose to just ‘let it rip’ through countries! That cohort of self-destructive fools are carrying the CCP’s agenda forward and enabling it for them, and the last thing that’s going to produce in the West is a vibrant recovered economy.
237
Fully agree. I cannot imagine what f**ls gave you red thumbs. Illiterates. I suppose that’s what you get when people are locked at home. However the red thumbing of simple facts and specific people makes me think they are children. At least mentally.
My ongoing counterpoint is that those countries which let it rip may create my mythical benign mutation of the virus, at enormous cost in human lives, but no different to previous self extinguishing pandemics. It is a far faster and free way to a vaccine to the world and more certain than the research so far. Plus it would be self distributing.
This time however we should recognize when it arises and use it. If number stop growing in Africa or South America or anywhere it is run rampant, we need to send in teams and isolate the mutation. No cloning needed.
Mutations are inevitable. More virulent ones will isolate. Less virulent will lead to a self extinguishing pandemic. Not in Australia. And in fact not anywhere where people are isolated when sick.
So my strategy would be to eliminate. Failing that to minimize. And to wait for a vaccine or a benign strain to emerge. Elimination though is working as I had hoped.
What I do not know is how good, cheap and fast the test for this virus is. If it was all three, we could open airports without quarantine, at least for domestic and regional travel. After all, we share this bottom 1/3 of the planet with only 2% of the world’s population.
127
And I would be intrigued to know why Cambodia (100 infections) and Vietnam (300 infections) are exempt. Vietnam has 90 million people!
My guess is that a similar bat virus infection wiped out a large proportion of the population a long time ago. They have paid the price. So if you checked 100 people in Vietnam you may find they have the antibodies at herd immunity levels. In other words, it has swept through but no one was sick.
Not that it helps us, but harvesting those antibodies with just serum donations would help greatly to save terminally ill people. And there would be no shortage of donors.
95
TdeF that suggestion re Vietnam that at some point in the past a similar disease swept through the population is an interesting one. Very worth researching.
Vietnam borders Yu-Nan where the bats which harbour these Sars viruses are found. And in the past the tribal groups who lived in the region moved from place to place across the present days borders.
Good thinking !
45
Only one thing to add, I think effective affordable antiviral regimes, produced in vast quantity, all over the globe, can turn this around in months (with mutations, or without favorable mutation). Plus that would permit international flights (sans quarantine) to resume much earlier. This should be elevated to an equivalent priority of looking for a ‘penicillin’ like anti-viral, applied to virus, and an early WWII like production priority to get it available everywhere, as fast as possible. We should be aiming to drop pallets of this with GPS-guided parachute from C-17 and C-130 to hospital helicopter pads, all over the region we can reach. We cab do that and we can do it long before a vaccine is available in quantities that will make a difference where it matters.
On top of everything else the world is made secure by that occurring as son as possible.
If it costs us $50 billion to do it this would be a bargain compared to the alternatives of global and regional plague, famine, war and the geopolitics and weaponry needed if we get a bunch of failed states. Plus we get our wider economic linkages and global transportation back. Countries and ordinary people need to see it can be beaten, it will ease, and they can end it. they need to see why resisting it without relent will pay off. I really hope people in Canberra and State Govts are thinking-big about this because our biggest losses will still be to come if they don’t look at eliminating the worst effects of COVID-19, at a strategic and regional level. Effective bulk supplies of antivirals can change everything for the better.
135
A lot of ideas in there. As in any emergency, our first objective is save ourselves. Then save others. It is perverse though, that the rampant spread of the virus in some areas may bring an end to this, as usually happens. However there is no guarantee of it as this virus is unnatural. Still many people have recovered, so antibodies are possible. And mutation is a total gamble. It will happen, but when?
64
Badge of honour TdeF to get red th*mbs now.
03
Is there any indication in your sources to show what treatments are being applied in each of India and Africa? In particular are they using the Zelenko cocktail at all?
Cheers
Dave B
30
Don’t know David, twitter feeds might know. Africa’s testing numbers are very patchy though, these countries claim a significant infection and daily spread rate but have zero testing, but some have the highest rates of spread in Africa.
Country | Total Cases | New | % Spreading | % Died
__Cameroon … 3,529 … 424 … 23.3 … 3.97
_____Sudan … 2,591 … 302 … 13.5 … 4.05
_______DRC … 1,538 … 83 … 6.9 … 3.97
____Somalia … 1,455 … 34 … 2.8 … 3.92
Burkina Faso … 796 … 0 … 0.0 … 6.41
______Chad … 519 … 16 … 4.6 … 10.21
Sierra Leone … 519 … 14 … 4.1 … 6.36
___Tanzania … 509 … 0 … 0.0 … 4.13
_____Congo … 412 … 21 … 7.3 … 3.64
_____Liberia … 229 … 3 … 3.6 … 9.61
Country | Total Cases | New | % Spreading | % Died
Four of these non-testing countries are in the Top-14 most infected African countries, so the actual situation is clear as mud. With no budgets or national capacity for testing, treatment is likely minimal. Dr. John Campbell has talked about the medical resources and treatment conditions in most of Africa and said that what’s needed doesn’t exist.
84
Bugger all granularity in them there numbers…they read more like a sport arena football or soccer score.
36
What’s stopping you providing “granularity”? Or do you just point these things out and leave it to others to sort it out for you?
Reminds me of this quaint little Denis Leary song which has a line in it which says;
” … I walk around in Summer time saying “How about this heat!” … “
42
Madagascar is using a wormwood based herbal treatment..
Ummm no stats on their recoveries yet from there..
It will be an interesting case study though.
For good or bad
24
WX, when someone starts quoting absolute death numbers I know they are just trying to be alarmist. Your point would be much better made by using a ratio such as deaths/1million or %of population.
51
Any better ideas for the COVID19 anomaly in Georgia?
http://phzoe.com/2020/05/19/covid19-in-georgia/
30
Interesting explanation Zoe, fits with the spreading pattern seen from imported workers and commercial linkages elsewhere, like Singapore, NE Russia, Italy and Germany’s early cases.
104
It’s a question of where the virus started. Just one infected person can start it anywhere.
With the limited mobility under lockdown, that can be anywhere. That person will have come from Italy or a cruise ship or New York. And they have completely infected a small region.
We had that in Burnie, North Western Tasmania and connected to two infected people off the Ruby Princess. Eventually 1,000 people were in isolation as they contained it but it is 200km from the population centre of Hobart.
24
Atlanta has the busiest airport in the whole world. It would make most sense for COVID19 to start there.
And indeed it did. The first 200 cases are all in metro Atlanta counties.
4 weeks later, the rural southwest of the state had more cases per 100K than metro Atlanta.
50
The ( dastardly ) ABC had a report from a small town in Georgia last Saturday..Focussing on the high infection and death rates..
I posted a link then to it.
Basic facts :
Local churches did not close despite the lockdown orders.
Families concealed the cause of death of victims from relatives and neighbours so that they would not be treated as outcasts.
Funerals for dead Covid victims where the cause was concealed were a major factor also.
16
I can’t do anything with that information. How do I know those 3 basic facts were not even more extreme in the Atlanta metro area?
30
1 :Go find the link.
PS The article noted that cosmopolitan Atlanta took much more heed of the lock down that the rural communities who thought they they were bullet proof because of their ‘isolation’. But people living in small town rural Georgia but working in the big cities brought the virus home with them.
03
Unless there’s numbers, the author is speculating.
Doesn’t explain why specific region of rural counties …
20
Zoe that’s an interesting idea. But those crops are all heavily mechanised and o not use much casual migrant labor.
But if there are counties in Georgia which have high levels of horticulture crops or orchards, you may hit the nail on the head.
They all need seasonal casual labor.
13
That’s a good point. Unfortunately there is no map data for that. Looking up highest fruit and vegetable yielding counties yielded an overlap of 9 out of 10 counties with the 3 top crops (Cotton, Corn, Peanuts).
In other words, the most productive counties are broadly productive in all types of things.
20
I wonder how much cross border activity is happening anyway? pollies like to dream they have control which is largely illusion and relies on a compliant public, apart from Tassie which would require some maritime or aviation skills to achieve. In Oz the borders are quite porous and fragmented if you care to look.
31
There is leakage but with only 8 new infections and those under lockdown, it is unlikely to cross borders anyway. However if there is a major outbreak, the closed borders are essential. It’s crazy to be wise after the event. Geographic isolation is essential, even if it leaks a little.
44
Right now, as an inmate of NSW and enjoying the splendours of country life, I do not have FOMO regarding Tas.
20
Good advice, or not? Seems like a much better approach to me.
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/safer-outside-alex-epstein-interviews-daniil-gorbatenko/id465769847?i=1000473825735
01
Maybe its time for Tasmania to be removed from The Australian Mainland welfare payments and become a nation like New Zealand?
As for the internal border wars, ignoring the Constitution but noting that a precedent was set during the early 1900s Spanish Flu pandemic, I worry that the Labor States are now ganging up to take advantage of COVID-19 to extend the restrictions to put off economic recovery for party political purposes? After all, Prime Minister Morrison is very popular now but would be be if the economy remains depressed?
Voters and even journalists ignore the Federation of States (former Colonies) that form the Commonwealth of Australia, and that the State Governments have more power than the Federal Government over economic activity in each State.
51
Nah, we don’t need another allegedly “independent” East Timor across Bass Strait, they’ll just sell the Chinese a submarine base to get a new coal generator, then use the UN and international court to usurp any remaining oil and gas in Bass Strait, then demand that we develop it all for them.
94
There are 4 states without Covid 19…
Two have labor governments
Two have non labor governments
There are two territories with low numbers
Both are labor,,
This is non partisan issue which is wonderful.
Or we would also have the complete catastrophe being played out in the USA..
God save us from such nonsense as they have there.
55
The very detailed Covid-19 infection tracking exercise carried out in Iceland detected that most infections originally came from people from the UK. The infected UK people were, perhaps significantly, mostly of families with returning visitors from ski resorts in the centres of the epidemic in Europe. This fuels any argument about preventing travel to or from infected areas.
However, the study further noted that there were no cases in Iceland where a child infected a parent. The reverse held true in every case. Some food for thought, perhaps.
30