Australia in a mess - NZ with a plan

[StartupRepair]

More than half of Australia is in lockdown now, sparked (imo) by the intransigence of the NSW Premier who ignored all warnings about Delta. Our procurement of and messaging around vaccines has been dangerously incompetent.
It all feels a bit bleak today. At least NZ seems to have a plan.

It just shows you the different stage Europe is to Austrailia.

There is still a lot of evolution to happen re pandemic in Austrailia.

Europe has had a hard 17 months. Some more than others, but on the whole it's been a hard slog throughout the continent. It's telling that pretty much every country has got to the same point of living with the Virus. Anything else would be far far worse for the inhabitants. There may still have to be restrictions etc brought in but only when absolutely needed to avoid a health system from being overwhelmed.

Australia obviously has the advantage that it can easily close its borders, but forever? To live in the world this 'expert' is talking about suggests borders must be shut for ever more. Which I doubt many Australians would support. Alternatively permanent lockdown is the other option........

Even some of of extreme Zero Covid views in the UK are slowly evolving as they come to the realisation that its not possible with Delta. It was never possible with any version of Covid though.....

@L1ttleSeahorse

I'm used to my (educated) extended family coming out with odd viewpoints about the UK as obviously each country puts a "spin" on things. (More recently - are you sending unvavcinated kids back to school?!) . I thought The Age was usually more on it?

Im loving the Guardian Australia live reporting as it's humourous/witty at times but sums up what's happening each day.

Yes, I've been enjoying it too, I particularly like they're ongoing commentary around ScoMo's ridiculous Crood's reference this morning.

one thing that keeps being missed when using the average vaccination rates in the UK - that get us to the high 80% for single jabbed and 70% something for single jabbed (16 +) is that we have 95% plus vaccination in the high risk groups - so 70's and over, maybe even 60 age group plus (I can't remember the exact figures now)
That is a result of us rolling out the vaccine strictly in age order (exceptions of course) and I think it's why we have lower deaths now than say the US that had a more open anyone can have a jab policy.
Aus and also NZ seem to be following the US open jabs to everyone plan, when they should be working and really really concentrating on the older age groups and high risk groups to get them as high as they possibly can before opening to everyone else.
They may well reach 70% or 80% as an average of the adult population but that's not good enough if it's mostly the under 50's for example and the 80 plus age group are still languishing at lower rates.
In other words, who is vaccinated matters as much (if not more) that how many are vaccinated. You need high rates generally but really really high rates in at risk groups.
And yes his comments on the UK, US and Europe living in the 17th century are back to front - we are where Australia and NZ need to be.
It's not actually going to get that much better than these countries have achieved imo and he completely misses the baseline natural immunity Europe / UK and the US have.
The general discussions in Aus are a fair few months behind ours and NZ are behind further still. I think it's just a process as a nation you have to go through like the five stages of grief maybe.

@Ozgirl75

Sydney Morning Herald was reporting yesterday that K-2 and year 11 will go back next term at least. I don’t have kids in those years but I can see it would be fairest to get them back. I’m semi hoping that in areas with very few cases they would let all kids back but even I can see how unfair that would be as it’s the poorer areas that have all the cases so to give school back to the richer areas isn’t a great look. I just hope they’re looking to other countries to see how they got kids back. Another 13 weeks at home is quite daunting even for me, whose kids are actually doing fine.

A whole term at home...? That is really tough. When that was happening in the UK I found the silence from the government on how we were supposed to work and gone educate really hard to deal with.

Reception and year 1 went back June 2020 in England. It was just awful for siblings who had to stay home. I understand that a decision had to be made but my 8 year old's mental health really suffered when her brother got to go back and she didn't. It was the right decision for my son but devastating for her. She found it all so hard.

Its their final term too isnt it? Like we were at June/July. So potentially high school leavers missing final term too like here. But different to here it's just one state.

Yes I think it would be hard on families if one child goes back and others don’t. Neither of mine fall into the groups that would go back anyway. Mine are at private school and I can imagine the outcry from parents if some go back and some don’t though!

@sashagabadon no, the vaccine rollout here has also gone in order of priority - first it was the vulnerable, older etc. Then frontline workers, then opening up in stages to younger age groups. In NSW a while ago some was diverted to younger groups that were in hotspots but that wasn't an overall policy.

In the US I gather the problem is more that there are so many anti vaxxers and younger people that think they are not at risk and have therefore declined the jab, even though supplies are plentiful. And almost all hospitalisations are amongst the unvaccinated.

I'm so happy DH and I have now received our invitations to be vaccinated and will be getting our first jabs at the weekend. It seems to have suddenly become relatively easy to get an appointment so I'm guessing the new supplies of Pfizer are in now.

What puzzles me is that now vulnerable people are vaccinated why is there not more pressure for schools to return. The major difference to now in aus vs where the UK was with schools were off is that there was no vaccine back then. That there seems to be no urgency amongst leaders to return schools in NSW (the most populous state I believe?) is a bit surprising.

The messaging seems to be the opposite. More "think of the children!?!?". Dan Andrews made a statement about being a father and protecting children.

(As in protect them from covid. Not keep them in school.)

newstart1234

I am surprised your surprised the powerful don’t want to give up their power

Those on full pay with gardens like parks who’s children go private school

Why would they be in any hurry 😂
Sturgeon here busy trying to keep the covid powers permanently

This suggests the percentage of disabled people double jabbed is lower than general population (under 30%) so there wasn't the older/vulnerable emphasis there was here before opening up to all. Or problems with take up?

(Guardian Australia)

I agree. I follow our school’s well-being bod on Twitter and she was saying how she didn’t want her child going back as she didn’t want them getting sick and I just thought, kids get sick all the time, it’s not that much of a big deal for a child to get sick is it?
I mean, there was a thing in one paper I read that said some children had “even”‘been vomiting at school - again, I remember one year when a virus went through school and apparently there were kids throwing up daily. It’s not so bad if kids get sick now and then is it? I hope I’m not being overly cavalier about it but when I was young I remember having a bad flu and being properly in bed ill for over a week, being able to eat nothing - then my mum got it and we were both in bed together being looked after by my dad. It wasn’t fun but I got better. I had various illnesses and as far as I can see for children this is no worse, symptom wise, than a bad flu (if that) so I can’t really see why people are panicking so much.

Certainly the research over here (uk) now seems to suggest its really not a big deal for Children. They get colds and bugs all the time... not worth closing school for!

The value in jabbing kids would be to protect spread/spread to families.

@L1ttleSeahorse they were certainly offered it a few months ago - no idea why people didn’t choose to have it.
Similar that we’re hearing that the people dying in hospital are 80 and unvaccinated. They’ve been able to get vaccinated since March so I don’t know why they chose not to - certainly it’s been available for them.

It's because the decision has been taken to get everyone vaccinated, not just the vulnerable. And it would obviously spread like wildfire in schools so we don't want to let that happen when so many have not been vaccinated yet. I really feel for all those parents in NSW with DC at home though, especially trying to work as well; it must be so so tough. And for the kids to miss out on school.

I'm sure schools will be a priority when it's time to release some restrictions. The PM was so so reluctant to shut schools in the first lockdown!

Agree with jabbing to protect families. Equally I don’t want to keep my kids off school for any longer than they have to. It’s been 7 weeks and the novelty of online school has worn off. We’ve hit a bit of a wall this week - they’re just bored!

Its really hard isn't it 😔. I'm not brilliant with term dates - do you get a holiday anytime soon?

We’ve got three more weeks after this one and then a two week break. Then we come back for 9/10 weeks before we have the long summer break. So if we don’t go back that term, it’s half a year of school missed.

[quote disco123]@sashagabadon no, the vaccine rollout here has also gone in order of priority - first it was the vulnerable, older etc. Then frontline workers, then opening up in stages to younger age groups. In NSW a while ago some was diverted to younger groups that were in hotspots but that wasn't an overall policy.

In the US I gather the problem is more that there are so many anti vaxxers and younger people that think they are not at risk and have therefore declined the jab, even though supplies are plentiful. And almost all hospitalisations are amongst the unvaccinated.

I'm so happy DH and I have now received our invitations to be vaccinated and will be getting our first jabs at the weekend. It seems to have suddenly become relatively easy to get an appointment so I'm guessing the new supplies of Pfizer are in now.[/quote]
Ah ok, that’s good then. Maybe it’s more NZ that have just opened to everyone ( or will soon) when they still have quite low rates in the elderly.
NZ also seem to be doing a whole family gets jabbed at once policy which might sound a good idea in theory but I don’t think is good in terms of community coverage. You’ll have some more motivated families / communities fully vaxed and other families / communities completely not vaxed and we know Covid spreads within families.
It’s a better strategy to have all the adults in a family vaxed even if the children aren’t imo.

@disco123 - either Australia hasn't done that, or you're heading for a very low vaccination rate. You've vaccinated at single dose under 44% of total population; as an equivalent, UK had done that percentage on 23rd March; that was still in groups 1-9 here. But I know from friends and you can see even on this thread that healthy people in their 30s and 40s are getting jabbed. That means your vaccination teams are prioritising "any jab" over persuading the vulnerable to get vaccinated.

As we have supply we are opening up in phases to more groups. It's not a queue where because someone in cat 1a has chosen not to have it for whatever reason everyone in cat 1b has to wait, and why should they? I don't know how the groups and what not compare to how the UK prioritised rollout.

If people choose not to get it then fair enough, but the idea is that everyone must have had access to a vaccine. I suppose there's an assumption that 20% will refuse it or delay taking up
The invitation, hence opening borders once 80% of eligible are vaxxed.

Although anyone that's willing to take AZ could get it tomorrow, no matter which group.

Disco, everything I’ve read is 80% of the whole population. If they open fully (as stated) at 80% of over 18s that vaccination number is quite low in terms of minimising hospitalisations and deaths, certainly by Australian standards.

I think they’ll u turn on this and keep extending the restrictions. Time will tell I suppose. I would never believe Australian would still be shut right now though I know people on mn had said this but I couldn’t imagine it, but yes they seem to be pursuing a plan that I find absolutely un- understandable.

No, it's 80% of eligible, which is over 12's here.