Is the government preparing is for a New Zealand scenario?

[lockdownbreakdown]

Does anyone else think we are going to be locked down until the majority are vaccinated and then the borders are going to be closed indefinitely to prevent new strains? I definitely get this vibe from all the stuff leaked in the press. It seems to be the only way we can stop new variant from ruining the vaccination programme as we cant vaccinate the kids if we let in new strains from abroad we will be going back into lockdown indefinitely. Thoughts?

But if there was no online shopping at all, how did you a get food and medicines? We’re supermarkets open? Did everyone have to travel out to visit the supermarkets? If so, we’re there hour long queues and nothing left on the shelves like there was here? Was there a one in, one out system for entering the supermarket? Was there a one shopper per trolly system? We’re kids allowed to be in the shop with their parents? And no, at the beginning of the first lockdown there were no gardeners or cleaners working. It was the same here- everyone who possibly could work at home did so!!

I've just read a long list of what was open during your March lockdown (far too long to print here), and there were all sorts of things on that list which we had no hope of accessing in NZ. Yes, you could order groceries online, but to answer your other questions:
Yes, there were long supermarket queues - one in, one out, yes some things ran out, yes one person per trolley, yes, kids were not supposed to go to the supermarkets.

I am Australian, living in Sydney. My DH is English.

To answer some of the questions anyone who needs to come here or go elsewhere for work purposes can do so. So yes all those journalists, diplomats, engineers etc are coming and going as they need to. They just have to apply for permission and have to isolate and test on arrival. Freight goes in and out freely by air and sea. We don’t have endless white collar travelling for meetings like we used to and I hope that there will be a cultural change around that. It’s certainly better for the environment.

What has stopped is overseas holidays. And even travel between states is a bit difficult if there is an outbreak of even a handful of cases. That is one aspect I don’t support as I would like us to act more like one country instead of states trying to keep themselves ‘safe’ by locking fellow Australians out. But we are lucky because every state in Australia has beautiful places to visit.

And in the meantime our kids will soon head back to school after the summer holidays. My 14yo is out with her friends every day, she just has to wear a mask on public transport and in certain indoor places. My 13yo will be playing cricket on the weekend. DH is back in the office mostly full time, but many people are still WFH. Life is mostly normal, with some modifications. I don’t personally know anyone who has had covid.

Borders will eventually open and I will welcome that because my brother lives in the US and all DH’s family is in the UK. Hopefully vaccines will be successful in protecting the vulnerable by then.

Get back to me when they've let 100,000 of their citizens die.

Or when the number of new cases per day at the peak of their wave is closer to 80,000 than 1,000.

If you see the word surging or growing rapidly in a headline, it's usually a good idea to check the actual numbers. In Japan that surge is

@lljkk

South Korea " government is described as having “sleepwalked” its way into the third wave, with critics accusing it of complacency and a failure to secure enough hospital beds."

Unemployment at 10yr high, too.

South Korea have recorded 1337 deaths since the start of the pandemic. In total.

The UK recorded 1348 deaths today.

The South Korean Economy shrunk by 1.1% in 2020 - the UK by 8.5%.

Sure, they had a ‘third wave’, but it’s so tiny that it’s more akin to our heady, low-covid summer of last year (cases in the 100s a day).

Tbh if you are faffing around preparing people I'm not sure you can be 'doing a NZ' anyway.

It's not so much what they did as how they did it. Quick, decisive decision making and a policy of acting early. If you are spending days thinking about it and preparing people, potentially letting the situation get worse in the meantime, then you aren't really doing what NZ did even if you end up putting in place the same restrictions.

@Remaker

I am Australian, living in Sydney. My DH is English. To answer some of the questions anyone who needs to come here or go elsewhere for work purposes can do so. So yes all those journalists, diplomats, engineers etc are coming and going as they need to.

Thanks for the info..

I'll add this for NZ:

www.health.govt.nz/our-work/diseases-and-conditions/covid-19-novel-coronavirus/covid-19-response-planning/covid-19-border-controls

Who can't enter New Zealand. If you're from another country you can't enter New Zealand. In some cases you can apply for an exemption, eg. as an essential worker or for medical reasons.

No idea of the numbers but there's that get out for those darned essential workers again...

And no, at the beginning of the first lockdown there were no gardeners or cleaners working. It was the same here- everyone who possibly could work at home did so

Thats not true, gardeners carried on working, so did self employed builders and in the offices and shops (for work) i had to visit during the first LD, plenty of cleaners too.
Our company was sending technicians up and down the country to do non critical faults & furlough meant that the work done by local technicians was done by folk travelling 100s of miles to do the work.

We are right now, allowing up to 2.8m HK citizens the right to settle in the UK.

Anyone who thinks we are taking CV seriously needs to wake up, this govts plan is herd immunity, via community transmission and vaccine.

I’m sure you’re all having a wonderful time in Australia and New Zealand. Good for you. Well done.

What we are saying is that we couldn’t have emulated your strategy of Zero COVID here for all of the reasons stated time and time again. I’m not saying our government has handled it well.

They should have reacted earlier and not allowed Cheltenham and festivals to go ahead. But we did not have the time line you guys did. WHO was saying was no point in shutting borders.

You all sound a bit smug and ‘I’m alright Jack’.

What we are saying is that we couldn’t have emulated your strategy of Zero COVID here for all of the reasons stated time and time again. I’m not saying our government has handled it well.

No-one is saying you could have had zero numbers, but you could have done so much better than what you have. What I am tired of is people trying to say your lockdown was the same as what we had in Australia/NZ - it wasn't, it was very much lockdown-light. People here were being asked to isolate on returning from overseas even before we locked down.

You all sound a bit smug and ‘I’m alright Jack’.

How charming you are! I haven't seen any sign of that. What I have seen is the same old excuses as to why the UK couldn't have done this, that or the other, and the constant whining about "rights".

Australia is open to NZ already, not many seem aware of that. Ok it’s a one way street as NZ won’t let you back in without isolating!

The first documented covid case in Aus was towards the end of Jan, so not months after the Uk. What Aus seemed to have that the Uk didn’t was a good deal of luck. They fucked up the handling of a few things that could have resulted in wider spread outbreaks.

The individual states at least have learned from their mistakes (mostly). They each have a fairly robust tracing system and they encourage testing for minor symptoms. When an outbreak happens they publish locations with times and dates for you to be aware of and encourage testing even with no symptoms.

The uk could have certainly done more in trying to keep covid out. At very minimum they should have required a negative test to gain entry, but what’s done is done. They should be trying to learn from their mistakes ( and mistakes of other countries, they are not the only country to fuck it up totally). I hope that once they have things under a little control they don’t get ahead of themselves and try to rush everything back to normal.

Fingers crossed for the vaccine working well, and hopefully we can roll it out successfully in Aus.

The main difference was quarantine isolation from travel

Very little in stay at home here and there

We complied and got numbers down

It lasted what, 12 weeks? We’re now back to another term of no school

There’s no ‘light’ as much as people overseas think they can imagine being here

For first lockdown we took it seriously enough for behaviour to change before lockdown happened - as they saw when tracing back the date

And I have no words for some of the crap we’re dealing with I know it’s bad but people popping up from o/s to tell us all about what we’re doing.., nope

this govts plan is herd immunity, via community transmission and vaccine.

You say this like it's a bad thing - what other plan is there?

You all sound a bit smug and ‘I’m alright Jack’

It’s only in response to the endless MN posters who state that Australia and NZ can’t “stay shut” forever and when we reopen everything will go to shit.

It’s annoying because it’s equally smug and full of doom and ignores the facts.

1. Australia and Nz have a dynamic, ongoing covid response. New cases turn up on the border each day in Australia. There is a plan. Public health teams are providing a 7 day service. Cases are being tracked. It’s bloodily hard work, especially those idiots who come in and try to evade quarantine and/or testing.

The individual states at least have learned from their mistakes (mostly). They each have a fairly robust tracing system and they encourage testing for minor symptoms. When an outbreak happens they publish locations with times and dates for you to be aware of and encourage testing even with no symptoms

This is exactly what’s going on. It’s taken a huge amount of effort.

2. when international borders open up again to tourists there will also be a plan, things won’t be the same as before covid.

3. vaccines are being rolled out. If and when incoming covid from overseas reaches the wider community the vulnerable will have a degree of protection. The Heath system will continue to cope, most people will be able to carry on. Things won’t be as shit as they are in Europe. Surely that’s a good thing?

There’s no doubt waiting for vaccine and opening up is great.

It still doesn’t mean we have haven’t stayed home as much as anyone - bar Spanish oh and Chinese for vast majority. Plus missed more and had an extremely tough time all round.

Nor does it mean we could have acted early v your early as it would mean Jan v late March

But yep vaccines will get Aus / NZ out of it.

But yep vaccines will get Aus / NZ out of it

To be fair, on a day-to-day level most people don’t feel “in it”. Things feel largely normal here. This superficial calm doesn’t detract from the public health teams who are paddling like fuck under the surface to maintain this though.

Yeh I know my family is there. We still have a laugh somehow comparing but yeh it is normal for them. They are in particularly low area too. Not Melb etc so no interruption to that.

Is the whole world not waiting for vaccines to get them out of it?

As for losing privacy/freedoms etc, we lost those in WW2 and got them back, NI lost them in the "troubles" and got them back.

They weren't texting private information to all and sundry as per South Korea.

Pretty much

But the waiting room differs somewhat;

Will lots of you be applying to immigrate ASAP, given how much happier you are with how covid was managed elsewhere in world? I mean, there seem to be 193 places to choose from.

@nolongersurprised

But yep vaccines will get Aus / NZ out of it

To be fair, on a day-to-day level most people don’t feel “in it”. Things feel largely normal here. This superficial calm doesn’t detract from the public health teams who are paddling like fuck under the surface to maintain this though.

This.

And I so want the posters who are side-eying NZ and Au as if those countries have somehow got away with it to fuck off.

Sacrifices of civil liberties were made and are still happening.

Yeh Echt

I’ll go for that fuck off

But to posters who pop up to say we did light version

Get real

Concerns around delayed vaccine rollout (there won't be any Pfizer in the country until end March at earliest, later still for those not requiring super chilled facilties). www.ft.com/content/bb1de4e4-7b42-43a0-b118-bb35719daca1

New case - loads of locations visited
www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/covid-19-coronavirus-northland-community-case-a-56yo-woman-too-early-for-call-on-response/YVSVIH27IQ3SMZSCV5U3ZCMED4/

I still think we should shut UK borders to leisure and bullshit business travel.

"I still think we should shut UK borders to leisure and bullshit business travel."

It does on the face of it seem as though there are arguments for that. But if we are still allowing in essential work travel, freight drivers etc, without 10 days supervised quarantine, will shutting borders otherwise in fact achieve more than it costs? I know the aim is to keep out variants, but once you have any exceptions at all to 10 days supervised quarantine, is it realistic to think you will keep the variants out? The cost-benefit analysis is the vital thing - would be interesting to know what they show.