No new locally-acquired coronavirus cases in Australia yesterday • Hacker News Board

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

#231

Post by mensetmanusman » Sun, Nov 01, 2020, 9:14 PM UTC

freddie_mercury wrote: post #126

apexalpha wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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. Congrats on getting to the magic 0! I know it can seem weird that Europe didn't lock down over the summer, but here we mostly use Health care capacity, not active cases, as t…

I live in Vietnam. It is neither a small island nor on a remote corner of the planet. We have a population of 95,000,000 people -- substantially more than any single country in Europe -- and share land borders China, Cambodia, and Laos as well as being within trivial sailing distance of Thailand, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, and Hong Kong. We have had 0 cases for over 2 months. You should stop with the "it i…

https://foreignpolicy.com/2020/05/12/vietnam-coronavirus-pan...

One thing we have learned is that it is easier for authoritarian regimes to deal with pandemics, because having a police state that knows everything about you makes it a lot easier.

So, the answer is, a number of things matter, and it will take many years to parse these things out.

Being a small island helps, being remote helps, having less public transportation helps, living in a police state helps, etc. etc.

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

#232

Post by anoncake » Sun, Nov 01, 2020, 9:22 PM UTC

DanBC wrote: post #221

nradov wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No the current IFR is significantly less than 1%. https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/hcp/planning-scena...

Those are not real IFRs, those are estimates used for planning scenarios. Also, they don't include anyone over the age of 80. > The parameters in the scenarios: > Are estimates intended to support public health preparedness and planning. > Are not predictions of the expected effects of COVID-19. > Do not reflect the impact of any behavioral changes, social distancing, or other interventions.

> Those are not real IFRs, those are estimates used for planning scenarios.

Estimates are the realest thing we have.

> Do not reflect the impact of any behavioral changes, social distancing, or other interventions.

How would these things affect the IFR negatively?

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

#233

Post by anoncake » Sun, Nov 01, 2020, 9:28 PM UTC

DanBC wrote: post #185

anoncake wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> First, deaths aren't the only measure. For every death there are many more people that just barely survive after a hospital stay, and data suggests a significant amount of those people will have long-term problems. ...where long-term means a few months at most. People do recover, just uncomfortably slowly. > Second, if the hospitals are overloaded by such people (even if most of them survive) then the IFR of Covid…

No, the current IFR of about 1% is the best case with current treatment options. It was much higher earlier on.

Do you have source for that? I think you're confusing the IFR and the CFR.

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

#234

Post by apexalpha » Sun, Nov 01, 2020, 9:29 PM UTC

0xfaded wrote: post #228

apexalpha wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As you say, all of Europe went into lockdown earlier this year. Only for it to come back and keep growing. What makes you think another lockdown would eradicate it entirely in stead of it just coming back again?

It would take an actual eradication strategy to eradicate it entirely. The first lock down was all about lowering the curve, which i think now is plainly a mistake. I also don't believe europe would be capable of implementing an eradication strategy. The required social capital has already been burned, and at no point has europe demonstrated it's ability to work together on this. Now we can only wait for the technocr…

I agree that it wouldn't work.

Even if the entire EU would agree to do it, we're still surrounded by other countries who might not do the same. And who's people will come into the EU whether we close the border or not.

(the guy who beheaded someone in France came to the EU illegally over the Mediterranean 2 or 3 days prior.)

Thinking an eridication strategy would've worked would've been a worse plan than lowering the curve I think.

We couldn't keep it out even if we wanted to. And yes, on that aspect, it's a huge difference to be an island far away from other countries.

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

#235

Post by Devils-Avocado » Sun, Nov 01, 2020, 9:33 PM UTC

0xfaded wrote: post #200

Devils-Avocado wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Federal Government forecasts debt will increase by $500billion due to the pandemic response. If we take the deathtoll from Sweden (lower than the USA, Spain, Italy, Belgium), Australia could have expected 15,000 deaths, adjusted for population. Less if we consider only excess deaths. This is $33 million per life saved, typically for a person in their 80s. Is this a good use of funds? If this money was devoted ins…

That's 25 grand per person. If life goes back to normal for Australians for 1-2 years before everyone else, that's a bargain. Considering that the Australian economy is based on digging and has an economic complexity just below Uganda[0], most of that damage was unavoidable anyway. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_Complexity_Index

Australia will be the slowest to go back to normal since they will need to maintain national quarantine forever - until a suitable vaccine is found and administered.

$25,000 per person is a huge amount of money, far greater than for any national scheme, ever. Probably approaching Australia's expenditure for a world war or major international conflict.

Keep in mind that currently in Europe - there is very limited excess mortality. For example in Belgium right now, there are less excess deaths than from a heatwave in August:

https://www.euromomo.eu/graphs-and-maps/#z-scores-by-country

Sweden and other non-lockdown countries are already back to normal. The only thing preventing normality is politicians who insist on lockdowns for a virus which is currently not causing excess deaths beyond what we would expect from regular influenza.

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

#236

Post by angry_octet » Sun, Nov 01, 2020, 9:33 PM UTC

nickthemagicman wrote: post #225

angry_octet wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just put in prison. With the new King there is a lot to be critical of, but for whatever reason he has held back on imprisoning people. The junta has nevertheless been quite harsh on critics of the regime.

Oh that's right 3 to 15 years of prison for criticizing the royal family....that's as fascist as it gets. Not a great model for any country to aspire to. How do we know Thailand isn't just executing anyone testing positive for Coronavirus? Would anyone report it if true with free speech laws like that? Pandemic Problem solved! https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/L%C3%A8se_majest%C3%A9_in_Th...

Well the Thais are really efficient at organising themselves and have an excellent public health and medical system. However, the notion that they can keep a secret like that is laughable.

Thailand has actually reopened to Chinese tourists to some extent.

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

#237

Post by doubleunplussed » Sun, Nov 01, 2020, 9:37 PM UTC

0xfaded wrote: post #200

Devils-Avocado wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Federal Government forecasts debt will increase by $500billion due to the pandemic response. If we take the deathtoll from Sweden (lower than the USA, Spain, Italy, Belgium), Australia could have expected 15,000 deaths, adjusted for population. Less if we consider only excess deaths. This is $33 million per life saved, typically for a person in their 80s. Is this a good use of funds? If this money was devoted ins…

That's 25 grand per person. If life goes back to normal for Australians for 1-2 years before everyone else, that's a bargain. Considering that the Australian economy is based on digging and has an economic complexity just below Uganda[0], most of that damage was unavoidable anyway. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_Complexity_Index

Wow, Australia has an astoundingly low ECI. Is there any way this could be confounded? I know we're no USA in this respect, but it still comes as a surprise.

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

#238

Post by doubleunplussed » Sun, Nov 01, 2020, 9:42 PM UTC

Devils-Avocado wrote: post #235

0xfaded wrote: post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's 25 grand per person. If life goes back to normal for Australians for 1-2 years before everyone else, that's a bargain. Considering that the Australian economy is based on digging and has an economic complexity just below Uganda[0], most of that damage was unavoidable anyway. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_Complexity_Index

Australia will be the slowest to go back to normal since they will need to maintain national quarantine forever - until a suitable vaccine is found and administered. $25,000 per person is a huge amount of money, far greater than for any national scheme, ever. Probably approaching Australia's expenditure for a world war or major international conflict. Keep in mind that currently in Europe - there is very limited exce…

The fear is the trend, not the numbers so far. Belgium's healthcare system is at breaking point, and the death rate is doubling maybe every 10 days:

https://chrisbillington.net/COVID/Belgium.svg

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

#239

Post by doubleunplussed » Sun, Nov 01, 2020, 9:44 PM UTC

grecy wrote: post #188

Devils-Avocado wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Federal Government forecasts debt will increase by $500billion due to the pandemic response. If we take the deathtoll from Sweden (lower than the USA, Spain, Italy, Belgium), Australia could have expected 15,000 deaths, adjusted for population. Less if we consider only excess deaths. This is $33 million per life saved, typically for a person in their 80s. Is this a good use of funds? If this money was devoted ins…

I also saw someone else say if we had done the Sweden approach and allowed those 15k deaths and saved all that money and ALSO made cigarettes illegal we would have saved many orders of magnitude more lives.

I'd bite that bullet - cigarettes should be banned.

In Australia the tax on them is continuously ramped up every year and fewer and fewer people take up the habit. It's obviously an elimination strategy there as with COVID.

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

#240

Post by thisrod » Sun, Nov 01, 2020, 9:48 PM UTC

TheBlight wrote: post #157

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…

I don't understand. Is the plan to keep covid out of the country forever? That doesn't seem to make a whole lot of sense at this point. Will there be a lockdown every time there's new infections?

The goal is to keep the virus rare enough for normal public health measures to contain, and continue indefinitely with some 2m apart and working from home type restrictions.

One effect of the virus has been a rise in geographic realism among Australians. Over the last 50 years or so, we have been very gradually coming to think of Singapore, Thailand, Taiwan and Japan as medium size, more-or-less democratic countries like Australia. This year, we've been forced to give up on America and Europe, and we're thinking more seriously about how to live in our part of the world, where many countries have the virus under control. Though not yet seriously enough to learn the languages they speak, or anything like that.