Small Island Covid Update.

[curiouswombat]

This is a 'state of the Small Island' covid post. Mainly for my own record, but also because we are, again, doing out own thing and are therefore, unofficially, something of a test-bed for the rest of the world

Comments

[kazzy_cee]

Very interesting! It's mirroring what's happening in my bit of the South East actually. Younger people seem to be the ones actually getting the infection but nothing more serious that regular 'flu so hopefully they are getting natural immunity too.

[curiouswombat]

Yes, it sounds much the same - and as 82% of the 18 -24 yr olds have now had their first jab, they should soon also become less likely to spread it amongst themselves.

[noadvertising]

I wonder how this will work out, but I hope it will be successful. Here it´s mostly the younger people, too, who get infected, but we are far from laisser faire! One after another events get cancelled, until we will be down to zero entertainment, and the game starts over...and over...

[curiouswombat]

We are very much at 'wait and see' - but we do have a fairly static population - you are either on island or not, there is no grey area, which I think must help us.

[shirebound]

So it seems as if vaccination is reducing the number of cases by a lot in those who are fully protected, and reducing the severity in those of that group who do test positive, or in those who are partly protected.

That's very encouraging to hear.

[curiouswombat]

It is, isn't it!

I know we can read about the effectiveness of vaccination in theory, but actually seeing the really detailed statistics that we have published daily, and taking time to mine back to check the age breakdown compared with last week and the week before and so on, to see where the numbers of total cases went up and where they didn't, for my own community, is really quite heartening.

[lab_jazz]

At the moment the delta variant is surging across NSW but we are currently virus free here in W.A. This is thanks to our state government with our hard border lockdown and our snap full lockdown whenever there is a case here.

[curiouswombat]

Our approach has, up until now, been the same as WA - closed borders and strict lockdown at 24 hours notice whenever the virus managed to get in despite them. Like yours, it has been very successful and we have been living pretty normally for most of the time, apart from mot seeing friends and family who live off-island.

But our government pushed the vaccination programme hard, and organised it well, and have decided that with the high level of people now vaccinated it is time to relax the border restriction, without imposing any others.

So now we wait and see if the vaccination programme has worked...

[lab_jazz]

But our government pushed the vaccination programme hard, and organised it well, and have decided that with the high level of people now vaccinated it is time to relax the border restriction, without imposing any others.

Our vaccine rollout has been a dog's dinner. I've just checked the stats and currently only 10.7% of Western Australians have been fully vaccinated.

The government is currently aiming for 80% of Australians fully vaccinated before they fully open our borders and relax all our restrictions.

[curiouswombat]

80% seems like a good target. We are closer to that than WA by a long way - but it must be easier in our much smaller land mass and most people have 'bought in' to the need for vaccination.

We have now got to 53,321 who have had both doses, out of a population of 85,500 - so a way to go to get to 80% of the entire population. Another 11,083 people have had their first and their second is booked - once they have their 2nd we still won't be at 80%, but we will be quite close to it - it would need us to have almost 68,500 double vaccinated.

But we are not vaccinating anyone under 18 at present - who make up about 20% of the population, So either we have to begin to vaccinate teenagers, or we have to get to 100% of the rest...

Are there plans in Australia to vaccinate the under 18s?

[thismaz]

Bless her. She should perhaps have warned them... unless she is a secret anarchist and this is part of a larger plan? In which case, good luck to her.

[curiouswombat]

We realise it is, in fact, a test event - there is always the possibility that the jinx is actually the NYM - and he is not going to the dinner as it really isn't his thing and she will doubtless be busy.

So if it all goes ahead with no problems we can blame him for any future problems :P :P :P