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No new locally-acquired coronavirus cases in Australia yesterday

covid19data.com.au

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Re: No new locally-acquired coronavirus cases in Australia yesterday

#51

Post by Jedd »

dustinmoris wrote: post #38
bobnamob wrote: post #30

To those citing weather as a likely influence, I'm not sure I agree. Given the graph provided by the linked site, it looks like cases started really dipping in late August. August and September are still bloody cold in Melbourne, where most of the cases have been recorded. Additionally, Australia is heading into a La Nina summer, generally characterised by a slower onset of warmer weather and greater average rainfall…

Yes, it was Winter and they were in a four month lockdown. Let me repeat, a FOUR MONTH lockdown. That is a bloody long time so anything but a huge dip during a four month lockdown would just be bizarre. Now they have summer, cases a low after a lockdown and due to the weather cases will remain low like we've seen in Summer across all of Europe, regardless what measures countries have taken. If Europe was to spend 4 m…

> Now they have summer, cases a low after a lockdown and due to the weather cases will remain low like we've seen in Summer across all of Europe, ...

Summer starts here in Australia in a month from now. (We'll then be contending with the return of bushfires.)

I think it's disservice to assert the weather is what will keep our case count low -- when a lot of people have gone through a whole lot of shit (and still are) to achieve & maintain the situation we now have.

I think there's sufficient contra-examples in both hemispheres to suggest that the weather is not a major factor -- though it is politically expedient & convenient to point at the weather to distract from mismanagement.

Re: No new locally-acquired coronavirus cases in Australia yesterday

#52

Post by Jedd »

yen223 wrote: post #42

Sydneysider here. Sydney hasn't seen anything remotely resembling an outbreak yet (not as bad as Melbourne's), but people are still wearing masks on trains, we are still getting tested (for free!), and businesses generally appear to be complying with covid restrictions. Life here has been relatively normal so far. I recognize that Sydney might still be due for an outbreak, but I have more faith that the chances of th…

Fellow Sydney resident.

My other half is a high school teacher - she's had I think 4 cases of cough / sniffles that have required a test, with the process being free (as you say), convenient (walking distance - there are many places that offer the swab test), and fast (results back within 48 hours, usually faster, via SMS & email).

I've caught a train into the office 3 times since March - public transport utilisation is wonderfully low (though I'm avoiding peak times), and most people seem to be good about wearing a mask. I've eaten out a half dozen times only, in that time, and again people seem to be behaving and handling things admirably.

Looking around at the rest of the world, it's equal parts encouraging & astonishing just how well we're doing compared to, well, not just the obvious examples, but almost everywhere else.

Re: No new locally-acquired coronavirus cases in Australia yesterday

#53

Post by Jedd »

tomhoward wrote: post #15

Melbourne resident here. We're feeling pretty relieved to be getting these results and excited to be tentatively emerging from nearly four months of fairly strict lockdown. Much is being made of the fact that back in August when Melbourne was reporting over 700 new cases on some days, UK and France were reporting similar new case numbers, yet we are now getting zeroes and those countries have out-of-control spread. A…

> ... vs the benefits of suppressing a virus that many consider to be not very serious.

I haven't seen good polling numbers around this, but I suspect it's not actually 'many', but rather a highly vocal small number of people, blessed with hubris, ignorance, and/or partisan agendas.

I appreciate that there's some significant impact to a lot of people, and that my world view is significantly skewed because I'm not in that category, but what we continue to find out about the way this disease can affect otherwise fit & healthy people, and with the unfortunate benefit of seeing what is happening in countries that aren't as committed to controlling this, indicates we've probably made the right decisions here.

Re: No new locally-acquired coronavirus cases in Australia yesterday

#54

Post by dustinmoris »

Jedd wrote: post #51
dustinmoris wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, it was Winter and they were in a four month lockdown. Let me repeat, a FOUR MONTH lockdown. That is a bloody long time so anything but a huge dip during a four month lockdown would just be bizarre. Now they have summer, cases a low after a lockdown and due to the weather cases will remain low like we've seen in Summer across all of Europe, regardless what measures countries have taken. If Europe was to spend 4 m…

> Now they have summer, cases a low after a lockdown and due to the weather cases will remain low like we've seen in Summer across all of Europe, ... Summer starts here in Australia in a month from now. (We'll then be contending with the return of bushfires.) I think it's disservice to assert the weather is what will keep our case count low -- when a lot of people have gone through a whole lot of shit (and still are)…

> I think there's sufficient contra-examples in both hemispheres to suggest that the weather is not a major factor -- though it is politically expedient & convenient to point at the weather to distract from mismanagement.

I'm not a politician, I'm not a nationalist, my birthplace is not the culture which I've been raised under, where my parents come from I've never lived and where I live now I have no ties whatsoever, so simply I don't care about country politics and trying to suggest anything different is the real disservice.

It's a fact that warm weather plays a huge role. In Europe we have seen a first relief during Spring and all countries have seen a huge dip in cases during their warmest summer months, completely irrespective of the countries individual measures. That's just a hard fact that you can't argue away in good conscience.

Furthermore, irrespective of how well countries have done, how many sacrifices people have done and what measures countries have taken (e.g. Germany vs. Sweden vs. UK vs. Czechia, etc.) all European countries see the same acceleration of cases. The only difference is the baseline where the spike starts, but the curve upwards is literally identical, so it further underlines that the weather has a bigger influence than any other measure except a full lockdown on the infection rate of coronavirus.

Re: No new locally-acquired coronavirus cases in Australia yesterday

#55

Post by andor »

bobnamob wrote: post #30

To those citing weather as a likely influence, I'm not sure I agree. Given the graph provided by the linked site, it looks like cases started really dipping in late August. August and September are still bloody cold in Melbourne, where most of the cases have been recorded. Additionally, Australia is heading into a La Nina summer, generally characterised by a slower onset of warmer weather and greater average rainfall…

There's a theory that relative humidity indoors modulates transmission.

At low humidity, water evaporates from droplets, making them lighter. The lighter they are, the longer they can stay suspended in the air.

At higher humidity it is more likely for droplets to accumulate more water, which makes them heavier until they fall down.

https://www.tropos.de/en/current-issues/press-releases/detai...

Re: No new locally-acquired coronavirus cases in Australia yesterday

#56

Post by Jedd »

dustinmoris wrote: post #54
Jedd wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Now they have summer, cases a low after a lockdown and due to the weather cases will remain low like we've seen in Summer across all of Europe, ... Summer starts here in Australia in a month from now. (We'll then be contending with the return of bushfires.) I think it's disservice to assert the weather is what will keep our case count low -- when a lot of people have gone through a whole lot of shit (and still are)…

> I think there's sufficient contra-examples in both hemispheres to suggest that the weather is not a major factor -- though it is politically expedient & convenient to point at the weather to distract from mismanagement. I'm not a politician, I'm not a nationalist, my birthplace is not the culture which I've been raised under, where my parents come from I've never lived and where I live now I have no ties whatsoever…

My point was that politicians that are incapable of managing this disease within their own borders would be happy to point to weather, as a way of abrogating responsibility. This claim is typically made without citation.

If people that repeat this claim, asserting it as fact, don't have citations -- then that's a different but related problem.

In Australia we got this under control through winter. Several states (South Australia, Western Australia, Tasmania, Northern Territory) had it so well controlled they had little if anything resembling strict lockdowns. Also through winter.

If 'all of Europe' (I'm not sure if you're talking mainland only there, or are including the very warm bits down the south, etc) is having the same results, then absent a control set to compare to, we can't know if that's an effect of comparable politics / culture, lack of controlled border controls, that a tipping point has been reached, or, as you say, 'because it's cold'.

Re: No new locally-acquired coronavirus cases in Australia yesterday

#57

Post by JimTheMan »

m0zg wrote: post #13

Another thing that's helping Australia is that they're heading into summer. Normalized by population the worst non-tiny (10M+) countries to be right now seem to be France, Italy, Belgium and Poland. And it'd be even worse in France, Italy and Poland in terms of new cases if they had the kind of testing throughput the US has been able to muster (1.24M tests a day). Belgium has comparable normalized test throughput. As…

I just came out of months of hard lockdown in Melbourne.

Everyone wants to downplay our results. But we went hard and obeyed the rules. I really do think we acted exceptionally as the public.

I see what other places with outbreaks are doing, and it seems very lax.

Re: No new locally-acquired coronavirus cases in Australia yesterday

#58

Post by anotherevan »

lkrubner wrote: post #31

Apparently it is relatively easy to control this virus during the summer, and almost impossible during the winter. Australia's summer seems to be helping it a good deal, even as winter in the northern hemisphere is making things much worse.

We are not in summer yet (i.e., I do not see any bushfires outside my window) but the weather is starting to warm up a bit (many low to mid-20C days) here in Melbourne. I'm not convinced weather is the only factor.

Re: No new locally-acquired coronavirus cases in Australia yesterday

#59

Post by 0xy »

Jedd wrote: post #53
tomhoward wrote: post #15

Melbourne resident here. We're feeling pretty relieved to be getting these results and excited to be tentatively emerging from nearly four months of fairly strict lockdown. Much is being made of the fact that back in August when Melbourne was reporting over 700 new cases on some days, UK and France were reporting similar new case numbers, yet we are now getting zeroes and those countries have out-of-control spread. A…

> ... vs the benefits of suppressing a virus that many consider to be not very serious. I haven't seen good polling numbers around this, but I suspect it's not actually 'many', but rather a highly vocal small number of people, blessed with hubris, ignorance, and/or partisan agendas. I appreciate that there's some significant impact to a lot of people, and that my world view is significantly skewed because I'm not in…

Lockdown has a death toll. This is just fact. People delay preventative treatment, they get depressed, overweight, suicides skyrocket. In Melbourne in particular, there was a giant spike in 12 year olds getting prescribed serious anti-depressant medication.

Four newborn babies died because the South Australian government did not want to risk flying them to Melbourne for treatment.

Lockdown primarily harms young people (ostensibly to save old people, the primary victims of the virus). I think this is such a sickening calculation.

We're enslaving our children to debt, depriving them of social lives (this can have permanent impacts), some of them commit suicide, some of them are denied treatment by government and die and they're not getting as much exercise and are also eating poorly.

I'm really tired of seeing people gloss over the effects of lockdown, because lockdown is dangerous in itself. Is the virus or the lockdown more dangerous? Well, that remains to be seen.

In Australia, an additional 4,000 - 7,000 suicides were projected beyond the norm as a result of lockdowns. [1] This is significantly higher than the death toll of the virus and is only a single datapoint. It doesn't include people skipping preventative appointments and dying as a result, or the long term effects of massive depression and obesity spikes.

[1] https://ama.com.au/media/joint-statement-covid-19-impact-lik...

Re: No new locally-acquired coronavirus cases in Australia yesterday

#60

Post by sjy »

alisonatwork wrote: post #37
dustinmoris wrote: post #27

It is important to point out that Coronavirus emerged when the Northern hemisphere was still in Winter and early spring, a time where viruses can extremely thrive and now the Northern hemisphere is seeing a second wave because we still don’t have a vaccine and are entering a full new winter with COVID. The southern hemisphere had only to battle COVID for a single Winter, and that delayed too, having had already the a…

It makes sense that winter makes things worse, but if weather were the only factor, why is South America seeing far more cases than Australia?

The population of South America is more than 15 times larger.
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