Covid 19 -

[FTE217]

Originally Posted by FairmontGS

Aunty Gladys speaking now - eastern suburbs BBQ Zeke's wife also a Z, no-one else so far. Gold Standard State tracers found the source as a US case who went into quarantine 28/04 in Sydney. Now they need to find who was the intermediary.

adding to this that is welcome corrective action :

New restrictions for Greater Sydney

The following measures will be in effect from 5pm Thursday, 6 May 2021, until 12.01am Monday, 10 May for Sydney, Wollongong, Central Coast and Blue Mountains.

Visitors to households will be limited to 20 guests – including children
Masks will be compulsory on public transport and in all public indoor venues, such as retail, theatres, hospitals, aged care facilities and for front-of-house hospitality staff (except in a hospitality venue when eating or drinking)
Drinking while standing up at indoor venues will not be allowed
Singing by audiences at indoor shows or by congregants at indoor places of worship will not be allowed
Dancing will not be allowed at indoor hospitality venues or nightclubs. However, dancing is allowed at weddings with a strong recommendation that no more than 20 people should be on the dancefloor at any one time
Visitors to aged care facilities will be limited to two people

Get the Zombies in control yer yer.

[russellw]

Data valid as at 00:00 GMT May 5th, 2021.

Note: As not all Australian States report at the same time, the data below is based on the previous full day reporting.

12 new cases for Australia and no deaths so the CMR is 3.047%.

6 new cases and 0 deaths for NZ so CMR is 0.989% and active cases 25.

The UK had a higher 2,144 cases yesterday and 27 deaths.

Just under 43k new cases in the USA yesterday and 839 deaths sees CMR at 1.780%. Note that the USA is actually minus one day due to time differences.

Other notable points:
Global cases pass 155M, the last 1M in 2 days;
Global deaths pass 3,25M, the last 50k in 4 days;
Europe passes 45M cases;
India passes 21M cases;
India sets a new global high with 412,618 cases;

Trinidad (399);
Maldives (734);
Bahrain (1,450);
Sri Lanka (1,939);
Nepal (8,605); and
India (412,618)

... recorded new daily highs; those in blue for the second consecutive day and those in red for a third or more consecutive day.

No countries move above the 90th percentile for their 10 day average while Ukraine drops below.

[Citroënbender]

Disappointing, but not at odds with what might be expected for some countries.

https://www.9news.com.au/national/in...0-a3b28e0c3813

[FTE217]

Originally Posted by Citroënbender

Disappointing, but not at odds with what might be expected for some countries.

https://www.9news.com.au/national/in...0-a3b28e0c3813

Unreal, good they got tipped off and action by authorities.
Love this bit from the article and you never know who you may cross :
Five Kimia Farma employees have been arrested and are accused of washing nasal swab sticks and reusing them.
According to the South China Morning Post, two lawyers who regularly flew out of Kualanamu airport say are planning to sue Kimia Farma.

Could be alot of 00000000's in this one to pay.

[Citroënbender]

Today’s NSW restrictions don’t address whether slightly awkward man-hugs are on or off the menu.

[russellw]

Originally Posted by Citroënbender

Today’s NSW restrictions don’t address whether slightly awkward man-hugs are on or off the menu.

Let me make that easy for you. They are never on the menu.

[lumen8]

Finance Minister Simon Birmingham says the international borders are not going to reopen “any time soon”

[T3rminator]

Christmas, New Years, Easter, ANZAC, Mothers day.....

Anyone wanna take a guess on when the next leak will happen?

Originally Posted by FairmontGS

Aunty Gladys speaking now - eastern suburbs BBQ Zeke's wife also a Z, no-one else so far. Gold Standard State tracers found the source as a US case who went into quarantine 28/04 in Sydney. Now they need to find who was the intermediary.

Bravo, beautiful, well done! Lets hope gold standard can find the missing link....this time.

Been a busy morning at work, missed most of the presser, but it sounded pretty fiery. Was there a preemptive strike on WA and QLD?

[Citroënbender]

Originally Posted by T3rminator

…Was there a preemptive strike on WA and QLD?

You could borrow Israeli political speak and say “preemptive retaliation”?

Hopefully Zeke and Barbie Grillman recover promptly without serious effects.

[T3rminator]

Originally Posted by Citroënbender

You could borrow Israeli political speak and say “preemptive retaliation”?

Hopefully Zeke and Barbie Grillman recover promptly without serious effects.

Haha that's a good one. Might borrow it... Could come useful in some meetings.

Looks like the norfeners forgot about Aunty Arden. Bubble temporarily halted with syd, travellers will need to quarantine if been in hot spot.

[FairmontGS]

Originally Posted by T3rminator

Bravo, beautiful, well done! Lets hope gold standard can find the missing link....this time.

Ya, we'll call Dan and the VIC ALP if we need help with tracing

[Citroënbender]

Très intéressant…

From this ABC News article

Professor McLaws said another line of investigation would likely focus on a passenger who boarded the same flight as the returned traveller from the US and was given an exemption to quarantine at home, instead of a hotel.

"Could this particular person have visited somebody or could the person under home quarantine, not been under home quarantine and not used their QR codes?"

I, for one, would be shirty if it turns out this is the case. Further, if one takes a wild leap into historical conjecture and asks “Where did they get this notion?” - a quick review of the Northern Beaches outbreak suggests they might have quietly come to such conclusion but found it unpalatable to speak thus.

[T3rminator]

Originally Posted by Citroënbender

Très intéressant…

From this ABC News article


I, for one, would be shirty if it turns out this is the case. Further, if one takes a wild leap into historical conjecture and asks “Where did they get this notion?” - a quick review of the Northern Beaches outbreak suggests they might have quietly come to such conclusion but found it unpalatable to speak thus.

I do recall questions along similar lines were asked in previous pressers on "unknown" leaks, but it gets swatted away with contempt. One that sticks to mind was a poor soul asked if one of the previous unknown leaks was caused by a "political donor" being allowed to quarantine at home, to which Hazzard called the journo stupid and that he would not answer it. I like to gauge the situation by looking at how things are said, rather than what is actually being said.

Having heard bits of replay of yesterday's presser, it seemed unusual and different to previous ones. Very snappy and fiery. And what was the kerfuffle on the QR code question? I didn't quite understand the angst.

Originally Posted by FairmontGS

Ya, we'll call Dan and the VIC ALP if we need help with tracing

Dear leader still on sick leave, and contact tracers are on standby for the inevitable leaks from across the borders.

There is however an ex quarantine manager available. With a name like that I think he'll fit right in, in Byron Bay.

https://www.theage.com.au/national/v...05-p57p6g.html

Crikey, 51 reported incidents in 4 weeks! I would have sacked the SOB after 2, regardless of how "minor" they were. Fancy refusing to get a test when asked. If I was a cynic, I'd say he was an implant to sabotage the program.

[russellw]

Data valid as at 00:00 GMT May 6th, 2021.

Note: As not all Australian States report at the same time, the data below is based on the previous full day reporting.

22 new cases for Australia and no deaths so the CMR is 3.045%.

4 new cases and 0 deaths for NZ so CMR is 0.987% and active cases 28.

The UK had a higher 2,613 cases yesterday and 13 deaths.

Just over 46k new cases in the USA yesterday and 742 deaths sees CMR at 1.780%. Note that the USA is actually minus one day due to time differences.

Other notable points:
Global cases pass 156M, the last 1M in 1 day;
Sweden passes 1M cases;
Belgium passes 1M cases;
Brazil passes 15M cases - more than half the South American total;
Asia passes 42M cases;
India sets a new global high with 414,433 cases;

Angola (392) - the previous high on 25/10/20;
Nepal (8,970); and
India (414,433)

... recorded new daily highs; those in blue for the second consecutive day and those in red for a third or more consecutive day.

No countries move above the 90th percentile for their 10 day average while Libya drops below.

[FairmontGS]

No new Zs for Sydney today.

[FTE217]

Originally Posted by FairmontGS

No new Zs for Sydney today.

In the wake of the zombie apocalypse, various survivors struggle to stay alive. As they search for safety and evade the undead, they are forced to grapple with rival groups and difficult choices.

Venture at your own peril

[FairmontGS]

Originally Posted by FTE217

In the wake of the zombie apocalypse, various survivors struggle to stay alive. As they search for safety and evade the undead, they are forced to grapple with rival groups and difficult choices.

Venture at your own peril

Did you copy that from the back cover of The Walking Dead?

[FTE217]

Originally Posted by FairmontGS

Did you copy that from the back cover of The Walking Dead?

as soon as I saw your post I thought of the WD, yessum.

[Yellow_Festiva]

UK opening international travel next month I believe I just heard on the wireless.

Some sort of traffic light system...

Australia and NZ on their limited list of countries.

However... at this time we won't be able to accept them.

More countries will follow and we will soon be under the scrutiny of other advanced countries as to why we are not following suit?

I'm wondering if there is an agenda behind the apparent super slow roll-out of the vaccine??

By the end of the year I predict we will be able to travel to at least 1/4 of the world's countries. Not because we are ready, but because we will be forced to under international pressure and our own population demanding why we can't do the same?

In time covid will be just another common virus we need to deal with and get a yearly vaccination that's modified to recent strains.

Much the same as the flu.

Sent from my SM-G973F using Tapatalk

[FairmontGS]

Originally Posted by Yellow_Festiva

By the end of the year I predict we will be able to travel to at least 1/4 of the world's countries. Not because we are ready, but because we will be forced to under international pressure and our own population demanding why we can't do the same?

Nice thought but I'd say get used to holidaying at home for the next 5 years...

[Yellow_Festiva]

Originally Posted by FairmontGS

Nice thought but I'd say get used to holidaying at home for the next 5 years...

Doubt it. I'm sure soon enough the travel restrictions will be challenged legally.

Time will tell.

Sent from my SM-G973F using Tapatalk

[russellw]

Originally Posted by Yellow_Festiva

Doubt it. I'm sure soon enough the travel restrictions will be challenged legally.

Time will tell.

Sent from my SM-G973F using Tapatalk

On what grounds? Or should we just give up on duly elected Government in favour of what?

The main problem with lifting travel restrictions is that almost nowhere has a good handle on the issue at the moment and as we have just seen in the Maldives it only takes a few fly-ins to start a big wave when they had almost nothing.

Yes, most of Europe is now better than it was 4 months ago but still racking up more than 110k cases per day so where would you like to go for your holiday? Or which country would you like to allow in here?

[Yellow_Festiva]

Originally Posted by russellw

On what grounds? Or should we just give up on duly elected Government in favour of what?

The main problem with lifting travel restrictions is that almost nowhere has a good handle on the issue at the moment and as we have just seen in the Maldives it only takes a few fly-ins to start a big wave when they had almost nothing.

Yes, most of Europe is now better than it was 4 months ago but still racking up more than 110k cases per day so where would you like to go for your holiday? Or which country would you like to allow in here?

Lawyers being lawyers they will find grounds, right or wrong. Much the same as the India restrictions are currently being challenged.

There is no perfect system. Right now the restrictions are justified and I agree with them but as vaccination percentages rise and more countries enter agreements to travel in certain conditions more will question why we can't do the same.

Once we are mostly vaccinated and infections / deaths drop dramatically what will the next excuse be?

As to countries? The green list England is adopting is a good start, as well as Vietnam, Hong Kong and any other country that has an obvious handle on the situation.

[lumen8]

Originally Posted by Yellow_Festiva

Doubt it. I'm sure soon enough the travel restrictions will be challenged legally.

Time will tell.

Sent from my SM-G973F using Tapatalk

Well they are being challenged right now, not just the India case, but another one which seeks to drop restrictions on us heading out.

They are clear in their intentions, which is to not make it a come and go free for all, but rather enable Australians to leave if they want to, legally, knowing full well they might not be able to get back easily.

Article about it...

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-05-...nged/100121648

That one by Liberty Works kicked off just this past Thursday.

[Yellow_Festiva]

Originally Posted by lumen8

Well they are being challenged right now, not just the India case, but another one which seeks to drop restrictions on us heading out.



They are clear in their intentions, which is to not make it a come and go free for all, but rather enable Australians to leave if they want to, legally, knowing full well they might not be able to get back easily.



Article about it...



https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-05-...nged/100121648



That one by Liberty Works kicked off just this past Thursday.

Well, there you go.

The population is happy to have some of their rights removed from them within reason.

Once it becomes unreasonable... well... "see you in court"...

Sent from my SM-G973F using Tapatalk

[Yellow_Festiva]

Sorry, not the UK, just England.

And it's this month not next month.

https://amp.theguardian.com/world/20...u-need-to-know


Sent from my SM-G973F using Tapatalk

[russellw]

Data valid as at 00:00 GMT May 7th, 2021.

Note: As not all Australian States report at the same time, the data below is based on the previous full day reporting.

9 new cases for Australia and no deaths so the CMR is 3.044%.

1 new cases and 0 deaths for NZ so CMR is 0.987% and active cases 26.

The UK had a lower 2,490 cases yesterday and 15 deaths.

Just under 48k new cases in the USA yesterday and 989 deaths sees CMR at 1.780%. Note that the USA is actually minus one day due to time differences.

Other notable points:
Global cases pass 157M, the last 1M in 1 day;

Bahrain (1,706); and
Nepal (9,023);

... recorded new daily highs; those in blue for the second consecutive day and those in red for a third or more consecutive day.

No countries move above the 90th percentile for their 10 day average while Tunisia drops below.

[Tickford.]

The shambolic handling of repatriating Australian citizens from India reveals the government's priorities

The media release from the Prime Minister announcing the resumption of repatriation flights from India to Australia hit journalists' inboxes just before midday on Friday.

And within seven words, it was clear just how "back on track" was the debacle which this week saw Australia not just close its borders to its own citizens, but threatened them with jail if they came home.

"Government chartered repatriation flights to the Centre for National Resilience at Howard Springs for Australians returning from India will resume on May 15," the statement began.

The Centre for National Resilience? Who knew? Most people just thought it was a quarantine centre set up by the federal government.

The important bit of getting this life-and-death piece of policy had been sorted out, it seemed. Getting a jazzy name for it. A bit like that ritzy social media post featuring the defence force contribution to the bushfires that was produced by the PM's office and produced when things were at the most sticky for him over bushfires.


It's about priorities and political opportunity

It's about priorities. And depressingly, the priorities in this episode tell us much about the priorities of this government.

What it tells us is that, whatever the underlying principles or quality of a policy, the government rarely considers telling taxpayers about it from the starting point of "we need to know", but instead see it too often through the prism of a political opportunity, or political badging.

India's COVID-19 pandemic has reached catastrophic levels. COVID in India looks like our worst pandemic nightmares.

Not entirely surprisingly, the number and proportion of Australians coming from India carrying the disease started to rise, given new variants were emerging that seemed even more contagious in one of the most populous countries on earth.

Australian authorities became alarmed at the risks this posed to people here if the virus escaped quarantine, particularly when it seemed some people were only showing signs of infection after the normal 14 day quarantine period had elapsed.

The decision was made to stop direct flights from India and, then, when it became clear that systems were not in place to track people who might fly from India via another hub, to put penalties in place to deter them.

To do this, Health Minister Greg Hunt made a declaration under the COVID-19 Human Biosecurity Emergency powers granted in March last year.

Technically, it was the Biosecurity (Human Biosecurity Emergency) (Human Coronavirus with Pandemic Potential) (Emergency Requirements— High Risk Country Travel Pause) Determination 2021.

Section 477 of the Biosecurity Act sets out jail terms and fines for people who breach determinations like this one, which is actually the eighth such determination Hunt has made.

Previous ones – also subject to the terms of this Act — have covered everything from banning cruise ships, to stopping Australians going overseas, to visiting remote Indigenous communities.

It's just that no one has really mentioned the whole "going to jail" thing much before.


Shambolic handling of information

Chief medical officer Paul Kelly wrote to Hunt late on Friday "to provide advice to assist your considerations to make a determination under section 477 of the Biosecurity Act 2015 (the Act) to make it an offence for a person, including Australian citizens and permanent residents, to enter Australia if they have been in India in the preceding 14 days.

"I note that such a determination, if made, would be the first time that such a determination has been used to prevent Australian citizens and permanent residents entering Australia".

The Prime Minister this week tried to defend the government's shambolic handling of information about its actions by arguing that it was the media that was responsible for emphasising the jail terms, not the government.

That would be fine, except for the fact that the whole point of making the determination was presumably to deter people from trying to sneak back into the country via a different travel hub.

And there was also the fact that Hunt mentioned jail terms in his press release, issued at midnight last Friday night.

The information flow from the government from that late night media release onwards has appeared as chaotic as the government's handling of the issue.

Fair enough to impose a ban if you think you need to temporarily pause the arrival of people from a country suffering the worst of the global pandemic because the quarantine system will be overrun.

But given you are dealing with Australian citizens who are being refused the right to come home (which we are told apparently doesn't actually exist by the way), you would think you might outline what you are doing to fix things during the pause.

What are you doing to help people stranded in India, for example? What are you putting in place to facilitate their arrival after the pause? Are you increasing quarantine capacity?

As news of the ban erupted over the weekend amid outrage and increasing questions about the legality of the move, and accusations of racism, the PM was nowhere to be seen. Any of his ministers who did appear looked flummoxed by the questions. The High Commissioner to India Barry O'Farrell also didn't appear for several days.


A really, really bad idea

And it only seemed to become a real emergency when the usual Coalition media cheer squad and the government's own backbench started to say it was in fact a really, really bad idea.

Despite this, government sources were still "briefing out" that the move was running hotly in the government's favour among voters.

Which apparently is a thing when you are trying to shape a policy to deal with a pandemic.

By Friday, the government was announcing repatriation flights would start at the end of the pre-determined pause.

But the Prime Minister was also saying that people testing positive for COVID would be left in India. The protest from the government is that this has always been the policy, whether for Indians or anyone else, and that this is standard practice around the world.

Given the scale of the problem in India, and the sense from events of the past week that the government has abandoned Indian Australians, or at least failed to put systems in place to help them, this will create new pressure points and questions about its capacity to run things.

The federal government only had two jobs: quarantine and vaccines.

It shunted quarantine to the states but in the last week seems to have stuffed it up anyway. And four million of us were not vaccinated by the end of March.

Determining who comes to Australia, and the circumstances in which they come, just doesn't seem to work for the Coalition as it once did.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-05-...nity/100125094

[pottery beige]

Originally Posted by Tickford.

<snip>

wow...

[tweeked]

Originally Posted by Tickford.

The shambolic handling of repatriating Australian citizens from India reveals the government's priorities

The media release from the Prime Minister announcing the resumption of repatriation flights from India to Australia hit journalists' inboxes just before midday on Friday.

And within seven words, it was clear just how "back on track" was the debacle which this week saw Australia not just close its borders to its own citizens, but threatened them with jail if they came home.

"Government chartered repatriation flights to the Centre for National Resilience at Howard Springs for Australians returning from India will resume on May 15," the statement began.

The Centre for National Resilience? Who knew? Most people just thought it was a quarantine centre set up by the federal government.

The important bit of getting this life-and-death piece of policy had been sorted out, it seemed. Getting a jazzy name for it. A bit like that ritzy social media post featuring the defence force contribution to the bushfires that was produced by the PM's office and produced when things were at the most sticky for him over bushfires.


It's about priorities and political opportunity

It's about priorities. And depressingly, the priorities in this episode tell us much about the priorities of this government.

What it tells us is that, whatever the underlying principles or quality of a policy, the government rarely considers telling taxpayers about it from the starting point of "we need to know", but instead see it too often through the prism of a political opportunity, or political badging.

India's COVID-19 pandemic has reached catastrophic levels. COVID in India looks like our worst pandemic nightmares.

Not entirely surprisingly, the number and proportion of Australians coming from India carrying the disease started to rise, given new variants were emerging that seemed even more contagious in one of the most populous countries on earth.

Australian authorities became alarmed at the risks this posed to people here if the virus escaped quarantine, particularly when it seemed some people were only showing signs of infection after the normal 14 day quarantine period had elapsed.

The decision was made to stop direct flights from India and, then, when it became clear that systems were not in place to track people who might fly from India via another hub, to put penalties in place to deter them.

To do this, Health Minister Greg Hunt made a declaration under the COVID-19 Human Biosecurity Emergency powers granted in March last year.

Technically, it was the Biosecurity (Human Biosecurity Emergency) (Human Coronavirus with Pandemic Potential) (Emergency Requirements— High Risk Country Travel Pause) Determination 2021.

Section 477 of the Biosecurity Act sets out jail terms and fines for people who breach determinations like this one, which is actually the eighth such determination Hunt has made.

Previous ones – also subject to the terms of this Act — have covered everything from banning cruise ships, to stopping Australians going overseas, to visiting remote Indigenous communities.

It's just that no one has really mentioned the whole "going to jail" thing much before.


Shambolic handling of information

Chief medical officer Paul Kelly wrote to Hunt late on Friday "to provide advice to assist your considerations to make a determination under section 477 of the Biosecurity Act 2015 (the Act) to make it an offence for a person, including Australian citizens and permanent residents, to enter Australia if they have been in India in the preceding 14 days.

"I note that such a determination, if made, would be the first time that such a determination has been used to prevent Australian citizens and permanent residents entering Australia".

The Prime Minister this week tried to defend the government's shambolic handling of information about its actions by arguing that it was the media that was responsible for emphasising the jail terms, not the government.

That would be fine, except for the fact that the whole point of making the determination was presumably to deter people from trying to sneak back into the country via a different travel hub.

And there was also the fact that Hunt mentioned jail terms in his press release, issued at midnight last Friday night.

The information flow from the government from that late night media release onwards has appeared as chaotic as the government's handling of the issue.

Fair enough to impose a ban if you think you need to temporarily pause the arrival of people from a country suffering the worst of the global pandemic because the quarantine system will be overrun.

But given you are dealing with Australian citizens who are being refused the right to come home (which we are told apparently doesn't actually exist by the way), you would think you might outline what you are doing to fix things during the pause.

What are you doing to help people stranded in India, for example? What are you putting in place to facilitate their arrival after the pause? Are you increasing quarantine capacity?

As news of the ban erupted over the weekend amid outrage and increasing questions about the legality of the move, and accusations of racism, the PM was nowhere to be seen. Any of his ministers who did appear looked flummoxed by the questions. The High Commissioner to India Barry O'Farrell also didn't appear for several days.


A really, really bad idea

And it only seemed to become a real emergency when the usual Coalition media cheer squad and the government's own backbench started to say it was in fact a really, really bad idea.

Despite this, government sources were still "briefing out" that the move was running hotly in the government's favour among voters.

Which apparently is a thing when you are trying to shape a policy to deal with a pandemic.

By Friday, the government was announcing repatriation flights would start at the end of the pre-determined pause.

But the Prime Minister was also saying that people testing positive for COVID would be left in India. The protest from the government is that this has always been the policy, whether for Indians or anyone else, and that this is standard practice around the world.

Given the scale of the problem in India, and the sense from events of the past week that the government has abandoned Indian Australians, or at least failed to put systems in place to help them, this will create new pressure points and questions about its capacity to run things.

The federal government only had two jobs: quarantine and vaccines.

It shunted quarantine to the states but in the last week seems to have stuffed it up anyway. And four million of us were not vaccinated by the end of March.

Determining who comes to Australia, and the circumstances in which they come, just doesn't seem to work for the Coalition as it once did.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-05-...nity/100125094

Geeze you can find some over the top garbage. Confirmation bias is your default search engine. Seriously, this is not even trying to look like journalism, it is a political statement.