(no subject)
I have... a lot of thoughts about Covid. The crux of it is how terrifying the rest of the world is right now, and not just because it's a Covid-ridden cesspit, but because nobody seems to give a shit.
We started out paranoid, and I mean that from a very top down level. First thing we did, before the pandemic was declared, was to close borders to China, then to Italy and Iran when they started taking off. The rest of the country was going, 'WHAT ABOUT AMERICA we should clearly be closing borders to America they're clearly a basketcase,' and so ScoMo* said, 'D'y'know what close borders to EVERYWHERE. Nobody but returning Australians are allowed into Australia, and even the returning Australians have to quarrantine for two weeks before before they're allowed back into society.'
This was the beginning of March. Next, all the service industry shut down for... geeze I can't even remember now. Time was frigging weird through autumn. Two months? Restaurants/cafés/bars could still do takeaway but that was it.
Meanwhile, BoJo's out shaking hands, Italy's PM having beers with the locals, Trump thinks it's the flu and continues arguing with health professionals about it. We were two weeks behind the curve, looking at the rest of the world and getting more and more paranoid of the bloody thing, while the rest of the world that was ALREADY SHIT also seemed to already not care. From the beginning, everyone was on the same side: PM, Opposition leader, chief health officers, media, state premiers, general public... we all got it. We were all paranoid and we were all on the same page. The criticisms came from stuff like the Ruby Princess (how were they allowed to roam free instead of going into quarrantine?) and Newmarch House (a nursing home in Sydney which, until Victoria's second wave, was the worst single outbreak in the country and resulted in the most deaths).
US and UK were already being held up as What Not To Do, but Jesum sodding Christmas, the more I hear from them both, the more terrifying both countries are. We can't be compared to them. Our approach, from day one, has been NOTHING like them. The only country we can be compared to is Kiwiland, we're both doing about as well as each other there. We've even opened up a little bit to them! SA, NSW, NT and Tassie are open. WA remains closed to literally everyone, Victoria is still sufficiently diseased that nobody's open to them yet and Queensland has border wars with NSW that are interrupting my potential holiday plans.
WORTH NOTING. SA never went into lockdown. The strictest we had was shutting down restaurants/etc and retail/etc. We were encouraged to work from home but it was never enforced; we were so paranoid that my own run into work (colour matching can't be done remotely) was cut from 45 minutes down to 15. We were encouraged not to gather in numbers greater than 10 but it was never enforced; while pictures of packed Bondi, St Kilda and... the Perth one I forget... Cottesloe, were being shamed around the country, our beaches had a solid 50m between people. We were paranoid going to the supermarket, looking at everyone like O.O and keeping our distance because fucked if we're going to be like the diseased convicts in the eastern states.
Admittedly our isolation and island-status have helped us to luck out, being that we have absolute control over our own borders, but like... Victoria also exploded in a second wave and, if you were treating that like another country (cos we've also been closing borders between states) it BARELY got out of Victoria. I mean NSW has been bumbling around 10-ish new cases a day after that Victorian truckie started an outbreak back in August, but they know what they're doing. Even the Vics have gotten down to two consecutive days of no new cases, good on 'em. Still not sure I trust their contact tracing but we'll see how they go.
And then the rest of the goddamn world. I CAN'T EVEN. I actively stopped following news after the US hit 100,000 deaths, and I'm well aware they've passed 200k now. Everything that filters through just horrifies me. UK decided to start shutting the borders and requiring quarrantine of international arrivals IN JUNE. BoJo you were fucked LONG before then. You're an ISLAND. Half the reason you wanted Brexit was to have control over your borders, a global goddamn pandemic happens and you don't close them until FOUR MONTHS IN are you KIDDING me? France started having its second wave, what, like two months ago? And announced testing would be free in Paris. You mean it wasn't before? No, it cost 60 Euro before. SMALL. FUCKING. WONDER.
Just... Everything I hear from overseas terrifies me. World leaders not giving a shit. Measures we've been doing literally since the beginning being implemented WAY too late, if at all. This article Sallie showed about Liverpool going back into lockdown, while the UK is still getting 15,000 new cases a DAY, and NONE of those numbers are mentioned in the article. And it was the BBC! They're supposed to be impartial and show both sides, but no, the entire article was about how much it sucks that people were going into lockdown again. This is the sort of news we have reported. Numbers all over the place: new cases (two in NSW and none in Victoria, plus ten in NSW hotel quarantine), number of tests, where the new cases were, no mention of deaths because there weren't any today but if there had been that would've been mentioned. We know exactly where we stand.
Rest of the world? NOBODY. CARES. And that is what terrifies me.
* Prime Minister Scott Morrison 'narti originally stuck this at Dreamwidth cos she lives there now.
We started out paranoid, and I mean that from a very top down level. First thing we did, before the pandemic was declared, was to close borders to China, then to Italy and Iran when they started taking off. The rest of the country was going, 'WHAT ABOUT AMERICA we should clearly be closing borders to America they're clearly a basketcase,' and so ScoMo* said, 'D'y'know what close borders to EVERYWHERE. Nobody but returning Australians are allowed into Australia, and even the returning Australians have to quarrantine for two weeks before before they're allowed back into society.'
This was the beginning of March. Next, all the service industry shut down for... geeze I can't even remember now. Time was frigging weird through autumn. Two months? Restaurants/cafés/bars could still do takeaway but that was it.
Meanwhile, BoJo's out shaking hands, Italy's PM having beers with the locals, Trump thinks it's the flu and continues arguing with health professionals about it. We were two weeks behind the curve, looking at the rest of the world and getting more and more paranoid of the bloody thing, while the rest of the world that was ALREADY SHIT also seemed to already not care. From the beginning, everyone was on the same side: PM, Opposition leader, chief health officers, media, state premiers, general public... we all got it. We were all paranoid and we were all on the same page. The criticisms came from stuff like the Ruby Princess (how were they allowed to roam free instead of going into quarrantine?) and Newmarch House (a nursing home in Sydney which, until Victoria's second wave, was the worst single outbreak in the country and resulted in the most deaths).
US and UK were already being held up as What Not To Do, but Jesum sodding Christmas, the more I hear from them both, the more terrifying both countries are. We can't be compared to them. Our approach, from day one, has been NOTHING like them. The only country we can be compared to is Kiwiland, we're both doing about as well as each other there. We've even opened up a little bit to them! SA, NSW, NT and Tassie are open. WA remains closed to literally everyone, Victoria is still sufficiently diseased that nobody's open to them yet and Queensland has border wars with NSW that are interrupting my potential holiday plans.
WORTH NOTING. SA never went into lockdown. The strictest we had was shutting down restaurants/etc and retail/etc. We were encouraged to work from home but it was never enforced; we were so paranoid that my own run into work (colour matching can't be done remotely) was cut from 45 minutes down to 15. We were encouraged not to gather in numbers greater than 10 but it was never enforced; while pictures of packed Bondi, St Kilda and... the Perth one I forget... Cottesloe, were being shamed around the country, our beaches had a solid 50m between people. We were paranoid going to the supermarket, looking at everyone like O.O and keeping our distance because fucked if we're going to be like the diseased convicts in the eastern states.
Admittedly our isolation and island-status have helped us to luck out, being that we have absolute control over our own borders, but like... Victoria also exploded in a second wave and, if you were treating that like another country (cos we've also been closing borders between states) it BARELY got out of Victoria. I mean NSW has been bumbling around 10-ish new cases a day after that Victorian truckie started an outbreak back in August, but they know what they're doing. Even the Vics have gotten down to two consecutive days of no new cases, good on 'em. Still not sure I trust their contact tracing but we'll see how they go.
And then the rest of the goddamn world. I CAN'T EVEN. I actively stopped following news after the US hit 100,000 deaths, and I'm well aware they've passed 200k now. Everything that filters through just horrifies me. UK decided to start shutting the borders and requiring quarrantine of international arrivals IN JUNE. BoJo you were fucked LONG before then. You're an ISLAND. Half the reason you wanted Brexit was to have control over your borders, a global goddamn pandemic happens and you don't close them until FOUR MONTHS IN are you KIDDING me? France started having its second wave, what, like two months ago? And announced testing would be free in Paris. You mean it wasn't before? No, it cost 60 Euro before. SMALL. FUCKING. WONDER.
Just... Everything I hear from overseas terrifies me. World leaders not giving a shit. Measures we've been doing literally since the beginning being implemented WAY too late, if at all. This article Sallie showed about Liverpool going back into lockdown, while the UK is still getting 15,000 new cases a DAY, and NONE of those numbers are mentioned in the article. And it was the BBC! They're supposed to be impartial and show both sides, but no, the entire article was about how much it sucks that people were going into lockdown again. This is the sort of news we have reported. Numbers all over the place: new cases (two in NSW and none in Victoria, plus ten in NSW hotel quarantine), number of tests, where the new cases were, no mention of deaths because there weren't any today but if there had been that would've been mentioned. We know exactly where we stand.
Rest of the world? NOBODY. CARES. And that is what terrifies me.
* Prime Minister Scott Morrison 'narti originally stuck this at Dreamwidth cos she lives there now.