Covid: Australia

No soup for Tony!

Down to 14 cases today after hitting 750 only five weeks ago. I could cry. #IStandWithDan

Doing great, Victoria!

I don't even know who 'Dan' is, but if he got your numbers down, I also stand with Dan! (From half a world away, it should be safe enough?)
I will now go Google who I am standing with.

Googling around (and discarding the #standwithdan hashtag that is for the Texas Lt Governor, who said that old people should be willing to sacrifice themselves for the economy) I gather it's a response to the folks who want to end the lockdown in Victoria and are likening Daniel Andrews to a dictator etc.

It looks like the case numbers are way down in Victoria, though, which is hopeful and also suggests lockdown measures do work if people actually follow them, or are compelled to.

Seems like every country has folks who don't care about stopping the virus as much as they do about going to bars and restaurants and so on. Sadly, in the US, our shutdown states haven't fared as well, maybe because they keep loosening rules every time we see a slight improvement and our police are pretty much not enforcing the rules that are in place anyway. Also, governors aren't allowed to restrict travel between states here, so even if we got down to zero in one state, new cases would come in.

So I stand with Dan too! Glad to see someone is making headway against this pandemic.

MIL and I were just talking about how envious we are of AU--and this is from NYC, where we're doing pretty well right now.

Roxxsmom said:

I gather it's a response to the folks who want to end the lockdown in Victoria and are likening Daniel Andrews to a dictator etc.

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Pretty much this, yep. Dan Andrews (our state premier) has fronted the media pack every morning, along with our chief medical officer/crumpet to give updates and answer as many questions as are thrown at him. Some days, he's stood at that podium for 2 hours straight. And he's done it every day. For about 80+ days now. Even on weekends. And the right wing media/politicians can't stand him.

It looks like the case numbers are way down in Victoria, though, which is hopeful and also suggests lockdown measures do work if people actually follow them, or are compelled to.

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DOWN TO ELEVEN TODAY! WOOT! (And two deaths, which is awful for those families, but the lowest it's been since July).

And yes, it helps that Victoria's been pretty much sealed off from the rest of the country. It sucks for me on a personal level, because we were supposed to head north on a long sabbatical this year, but I prefer not to risk spreading the virus. So we rescheduled. (I do know people who've cheated the system to get around the closed borders, but I'm not an entitled asshole, so we'll go when it's safe for everyone.)

So I stand with Dan too! Glad to see someone is making headway against this pandemic.

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The fun hashtag to browse at the moment is #DanMustGo, which was started by the 'Dictator Dan' naysayers. But has now been hijacked to say things like #DanMustGo to bed, he must be tired after showing such great leadership, and #DanMustGo to the pub with me once it's reopened so I can buy his a beer, and #DanMustGo on to be Prime Minister. And the trolls/bots don't realise they've been hijacked, so they keep retweeting all these messages of support.

I'm not on Twitter but #DanMustGo tell every other country how to get the same results!

My Australian daughter-in-law lives in the US and wants to go home to visit her ailing father. Her airline reservation has been cancelled 3 times because they are only letting 350 people per day land at the Sydney airport. When she gets there - with 3 year old son- she has to stay in a hotel for 2 weeks at her own expense and can't leave her room. (Imagine spending 14 days locked in a hotel room with a 3 year old!). there's a cop on each floor of the hotel making sure “guests” don't leave their room.

Gregg said:

My Australian daughter-in-law lives in the US and wants to go home to visit her ailing father. Her airline reservation has been cancelled 3 times because they are only letting 350 people per day land at the Sydney airport. When she gets there - with 3 year old son- she has to stay in a hotel for 2 weeks at her own expense and can't leave her room. (Imagine spending 14 days locked in a hotel room with a 3 year old!). there's a cop on each floor of the hotel making sure “guests” don't leave their room.

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The number of pax entering Australia (via 4 major airports) is determined by the availability of flights (with restrictions on seating) and hotel rooms. At the start of the pandemic, the country's border was locked down quickly to arrivals from China, Iran and Italy, which were the earliest hotspots, but we did not close the border to travellers from the USA and that caused a problem. (And then there was the monumentally stupid issue of cruise ships...)

Internal travel is restricted too. At the moment, you can't cross from Victoria into any other state (with a few exceptions) and travel within Vic is also limited. Other states have highly-regulated borders with provisions for essential travel (without quarantine) and non-essential travel (with self-funded quarantine at nominated hotels). There's been some bleating from QAnons and sniping from the Libs and Nats, but mostly people just get on with it. We'd rather put up with some inconvenience now.

Yeah, I feel awful for Aussies struggling to get home, especially those trying to reach sicked loved ones. The opposition's putting pressure on the government to increase daily arrivals (there's now a staggered increase planned).

But hotel quarantine isn't prison. Pretty much everyone here understands why it would be utter madness to allow someone from (for example) the US -- where the virus is rampant and over 200K people have tragically died -- to roam freely around the place on arrival.

I get that it sucks to have to stay in a hotel for two weeks at your own expense to quarantine, but with Covid so widespread here in the US, and with our own mitigation efforts such a patchwork of policies many ignore anyway, I can't blame them for being strict. As others have pointed out, the honor system didn't work. The good news is the number of cases has been decreasing sharply, so the approach appears to be working. Wish we'd had a more comprehensive and centralized approach to handling the crisis here. It could have saved a lot of lives.

As for the cops making sure people stay in their rooms? Remember the situation that caused the resurgence of the virus in Melbourne? They were relying on hotel security to keep the quarantined travelers in their rooms, and they essentially "cheated" and took people shopping and so on.

Rolling average down again and #DanforPM trending. You can do this, Victoria!

Helix said:

Rolling average down again and #DanforPM trending. You can do this, Victoria!

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Very happy down here today. The sun is shining, the numbers are good, and it seems Dan's done the "under promise, over deliver" thing, and our restrictions might lift more than expected next week.

That man deserves the longest, most relaxing holiday when this is over. But you just know he won't take one.

Yay, Victoria! Looking good.

“We believe we will be able to take the next step – which is when all the restrictions leaving your home when there is much more freedom of movement – on 19 October,” says Andrews.

“We are at least a week ahead of schedule. But we must wait and see how things unfold over the next three weeks and then make those decisions and speak about likely timeframes in November. This is a strategy that is designed to get us to a Covid-normal Christmas.”

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Helix said:

Yay, Victoria! Looking good.

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Down to 5 cases today. FIVE!!!

I haven't been so happy with that number since Pat Cummins' last five fer.

be frank said:

Down to 5 cases today. FIVE!!!

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I haven't been so happy with that number since Pat Cummins' last five fer.

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Covid-related.

WA Premier Mark McGowan has launched defamation proceedings against Clive Palmer.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-09-23/mark-mcgowan-takes-legal-action-against-clive-palmer/12691798

L--and I can't stress this strongly enough--OL