Why? Vaccination is increasing not decreasing. Not as thoroughly as anyone would like but it’s happening. I can see a time when the standard set of vaccines a baby gets will include something for Covid. And that won’t be too far away. Countries that worship the stupid are not as prominent as USA’s lock on world’s media would have you believe.
The disease will never go away but I think vaccination will take things to the point where getting it is a choice for most people.
Because vaccines do not prevent people from catching or passing on the disease.
A fully vaccinated population with open borders and a normal life will have lots of the virus circulating in it, that is an inescapable fact.
In such a world the response to such circulation cannot be to have rolling lockdowns forever.
I’m not getting your reasoning. Palasczczuk closed the borders just as NSW did to Victoria but it was the right thing for NSW but partisanship for Qld? How does that work? And Palaszczuk’s closing of the border was wholeheartedly supported (indeed advocated) by the same type of health professionals you think Gladys was lucky enough to be able follow. Why is that not rank hypocrisy? Particularly when (see below) Palaszczuk wasn’t in the sort of political lull that Gladys had available. On the contrary, she had the opposition leader criticizing everything she did (yet she still followed the expert advice).
And I really think you need to take a closer look at the history to see who was firing the shots - it was Murdoch media, and the Libs in NSW and Canberra who were taking potshots at Qld for having the temerity to close its border. Meanwhile, we had the local Lib opposition leader attacking Paluszczuk for taking measures that have proven effective. And then when Palaszczuk defends herself by pointing out that the measures taken by her government were, yanno, very fucking successful, she’s “playing politics”!?
No. Just no. I’m completely prepared to accept that Paluszczuk was mediocre, lucky, merely did the obvious etc. But when someone was in charge when almost everything went right, one does not get to say their actions were merely “playing politics”.
Rant over.
*I was at UQ at the same time as Paluszczuk and know people who knew her. They don’t have much good to say. They say she was and is a stodgy, single-minded political and bureaucratic lizard. I don’t think much of her but my view is that her brand of stodgy caution has dealt with the pandemic fairly well. Or at the least has meant she didn’t fuck anything much up.
The latest date for a normal House and half senate election is 21 May next year. So we will have the opportunity to get rid of Morrison then but, despite the government’s ineptitude and blatant corruption, I wouldn’t bet my life on Labor winning. I hope I’m wrong, but I have heard some surprising thoughts from people that I assumed would do anything to get that lot out.
…the virus arrives at our borders every single day. We aren’t going to just flip the switch and open the floodgates. We know where the cases are coming from. It can be managed, and if need be then we can take the appropriate action.
You are talking as if these issues haven’t been debated and discussed nationally here since the start of the pandemic. But they have been.
I’ve already addressed this. It’s not the numbers that matter. It’s the source of transmission. If we can’t identify the source or genomically link the case back to a known case then it is more likely we will lockdown regardless of the numbers.
Is it sustainable forever? Nope. But most of us here are in this for the long haul. I had to completely reinvent my business in order for it to continue, and I’m fine with that. It will be at least another year of restrictions at the border. How long that lasts isn’t really dependent on what we do, it’s dependent on what you do.
Well that’s a shame because if you are talking about the New Zealand elimination strategy then you either are talking in epidemiological terms, or you aren’t talking about us at all.
NZ is already opening up again. And we are doing it from a public-health centric approach, with the health and the well-being of New Zealanders, especially the most vulnerable, at the core of that approach. You keep acting as if we don’t know the state of the world.
We know that we will have outbreaks. Its why we have an elimination strategy. To both prevent outbreaks, then to deal with outbreaks when they happen.
And I really don’t think you understand how infrequent lockdowns are here. We had one major lockdown (Level 4) that ended in May 2020. We had an escalation to Level 3 in Auckland in August/September last year. We had an escalation to Level 3 in February in Auckland that lasted 3 days, then another at the end of Feb that lasted a couple of weeks.
Compared to what the rest of the world has had to endure those lockdowns were nothing. And if we had a community outbreak tomorrow in Wellington then it would be annoying, but I’d gladly stay home, sit on my arse and watch netflix for a few weeks if need be while our public health officials ramp up testing, contact tracing, genomic sequencing and whatever else it takes to keep everyone safe.
And we accept them as reasonable here because they are only used when absolutely necessary, and that they have been proven to work.
Not entirely. But for vaccinated people to shed the virus and infect others is rare. Meaning the R value will be low enough for potential outbreaks to fizzle.
I’m not sure where your hostility is coming from. I’m not criticising what was done nor what continues to be done. What I’ve said is not a criticism of NZ at all. It is merely a look forward to what the realities of the world will be like.
Yes and all future degrees of opening will lead to even more cases in the community. You have kept it in check with extremely strict controls and starting from a very low level. Any loosening of those controls will lead to more cases. That is unavoidable.
Then you agree with the point I was making. At some point you will need to learn to live with it without locking down.
And maybe this is something you don’t understand and haven’t experienced. A lot of the rest of the world is fatigued by multiple lockdowns and restrictions of much longer periods. Populations have limits.
I’m saying that if your response to the guaranteed increased levels of infection, even amongst a vaccinated population is to continue lockdown indefinitely then there will come a point where the people will not accept it.
It may be your wording here but I understand symptomatic and asymptomatic vaccinated people are just as infectious individually, though they are most certainly fewer in number (the research is changing all the time mind you so my understanding may be out of date).
Of course any variant that does manage to thrive amongst vaccinated people will, by necessity, be very adept at spreading itself.
But in general you are right, the whole point of the vaccines is to
a) reduce the risks of severe illness and dying
b) reduce the risk of getting it in the first place
c) reduce the risk of passing it on
And they are all excellent at doing that but no-one I’ve read is suggesting anything other than this virus is here for the long-haul. It will continue circulating in the population in one form or another for the forseeable future.
Yes it may continue circulating in the population in one form or another for the foreseeable future. But that doesn’t mean it’s going to do so in any harmful or important form, or to any significant extent. As you say the research is changing all the time but the cites I have read suggest that for a vaccinated person to be infectious is “rare”. Rare things do not lead to high R numbers. And indeed once the R is below 1, outbreaks peter out of their own accord.
Sure, for the sake of clarity though it is important to understand what is meant when we say “rare”.
Is passing on the infection a rare event because widespread vaccination means less people get it in the first place? does the vaccine have an effect of the bodies ability to pass on the infection? a bit of both?
It can make a big difference when considering public health policies and restrictions.
…I’m not sure why you are reading hostility. You are simply getting things wrong and I am correcting you.
Your “realities” are based on misconceptions of our strategy.
Well, no, the strategy of elimination doesn’t change. That means continuing to manage the border, and if we see a surge in cases taking appropriate action. And what those actions will be will be dependent on how many people in NZ are vaccinated, if those cases are mysteries or linked to known cases.
We didn’t work hard for the last year and a half just to let Covid in and start killing lots and lots of people. Our healthcare would struggle to cope with even a moderate outbreak. We don’t have a very big ICU capacity at all compared to other similar nations. We are in a very different position to the rest of the world. What you see as “unavoidable” we’ve been avoiding for the last year and a half. And we will continue to try and avoid it for as long as we need to.
Nope.
Hell no.
We are watching the rest of the world try to “live with it.” And we don’t want that here. You can do whatever you want where you live. But if an occasional lockdown is the price we pay for keeping our people safe and being able to live free with only restrictions at the borders then I will pay that price, and most of New Zealanders agree with that.
And why do you think we would want that here? This is a you problem, not a we problem. We aren’t fatigued by multiple lockdowns. “Learning to live with it” would result in fatigue. Populations do have limits. And we would rather not push the limits here, thanks.
What does “lockdown indefinitely” even mean in the New Zealand context? Our last Level 3 lockdown was in February in Auckland and it lasted two weeks. We had a Level 2 lockdown last month here in Wellington: but all that mean was that we couldn’t have gatherings over 100 people and it only lasted a week and that was effectively it.
Lockdowns are very rare here. We have been effectively living normal lives since May 2020. We wear masks on public transport but nowhere else. We can leave the country any time we like but if we return we have to stay in managed isolation for 14 days.
But that’s it. When you say “lockdown indefinitely” what exactly do you mean?
You aren’t factoring in the timeline.
Obviously my news sources are Sydney based but Channel 9 and the ABC aren’t Murdoch.
Oct 2, 2020 Queensland announces plan to ease border restrictions on 1st November
The Queensland border will open to New South Wales in a month’s time as part of the state’s roadmap to recovery announced today.
The border between the two states will open on November 1 on the proviso NSW does not record any cases of community transmission for 28 days.
At the time achieving 28 consecutive days of zero community infections within NSW was considered a really high bar. Potentially just a single case per month without COVID eradication and the border could theoretically be permanently closed.
Oct 6, 2020 Queensland election called for 31st October
The writs have been signed and the Queensland state election has officially been called with both party leaders hitting the campaign trail touting “economic recovery”.
Queenslanders will go to the polls on October 31, with Ms Palaszczuk battling it out with LNP leader Deb Frecklington for leadership.
Wasn’t that just the most amazingly fortuitous timing and political good fortune?
30 Oct 2020 Queensland announce plans to open border with regional NSW
Queensland will open its border to New South Wales from 1:00am on November 3, but it will remain closed to Greater Sydney and Victoria, Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk says.
Another instance of fortuitous timing just the day before the election with the polls running strongly QLD LAB’s way. It should be pointed out that NSW did not achieve the 28 days without infection threshold until late November and following that the residents of Greater Sydney were allowed passage into Queensland from December 3rd.
31 Oct Ms Palaszczuk’s Queensland State government wins a third term convincingly
3 Nov The great unwashed populace from the NSW fringe of the Gold Coast hinterland are welcomed back over the border to stimulate the Queensland economic recovery.
I’m not big on conspiracy theories but that serendipitous timeline doesn’t fall into place based on scientific advise only.
On the other hand the Murdoch press were, as you say baying for blood.
Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk played up fears about COVID-19 and talked up her government’s closed border policy as her main pitch to win the October 31 state election.
Despite Queensland having the highest unemployment rate in the country and a tourism sector decimated by closed borders, Ms Palaszczuk again defended the draconian border regime at the ALP campaign launch on Sunday.
“Our government secured Queensland’s borders to keep Queenslanders safe. Because of that, we have secured the health of the economy,” Ms Palaszczuk told a small gathering of Labor supporters at Beenleigh, south of Brisbane.
The closed border policy, which is popular despite the damage being done to the state’s tourism-dependent economy, is expected to deliver the Palaszczuk government a third term in office on October 31. (Queensland may open its borders to NSW on November 1, assuming there is no further outbreak in NSW).
Queensland business leaders have warned the state’s spiralling debt is not sustainable as they slammed Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk for persisting with draconian border policies as a cynical bid to win the October 31 election.
I’m just basing that on the tone of your responses to my pretty innocuous points. No-one else seems to have taken it quite so personally.
And you don’t seem to be correcting me, you seem to be correcting someone else’s arguments.
If you were uncertain what I meant about that I’m a bit surprised it has taken you this long to ask for clarication.
I mean what I said in my very first posts in this thread about “rolling lockdowns forever” i.e. that the response to the infections will continue to be a policy of lockdowns whenever they arise and that that policy continues forever. Five years of rolling lockdowns? Ten? Twenty?
That is unsustainable, I’d be very surprised if somewhere in the NZ long term strategy there isn’t reference made to ways of avoiding having to do that.
You yourself agreed that your current approach is unsustainable. Your actual words when talking about lockdowns
I mean, that is in absolute agreement with me. I’m a bit lost as to why you think otherwise.
I’d be very surprised if somewhere in the NZ long term strategy there isn’t reference made to ways of avoiding having to do that.
This isn’t like measles where high levels of vaccination can stop it dead in it’s tracks. Vaccinations and future treatments can probably get the risk from the virus down to something approaching flu levels of mortality and at that point lockdowns are unlikely to be seen as a proportionate response and I suggest would not be tolerated.
…I haven’t taken anything personally. You are talking about New Zealand, I live and know a lot about New Zealand and our elimination strategy, you keep getting things wrong, I keep pointing those things out.
That’s it.
I’m correcting you.
I’m surprised that you are surprised.
“Rolling lockdowns” are not “indefinite lockdowns” and neither are an accurate description of what we do here. We’ve only had two Level 3 lockdowns this year, both localised to Auckland, one lasted 3 days and one lasted two weeks. Both finished in Feb.
These aren’t “rolling lockdowns.” They were targeted lockdowns to isolate the potentially infected, allowing time for our contact tracing teams to map out the chain, identify close contacts and ring-fence the cluster.
Can we keep that up for five years? Sure. Ten? Most certainly. Twenty? Probably. A couple of localised targeted lockdowns a year are much less expensive in both money and lives than the alternative.
Our current strategy already looks for ways to avoid that. Thats why we have had multiple community outbreaks where we didn’t lockdown. Lockdowns are always the last resort. However if the situation demands it (and that situation is a question answered by the scientists and the doctors, then “rubber-stamped” by the politicians) then why wouldn’t you lockdown? Why take a way tools in the arsenal?
You are missing the context here. “Forever” for me means beyond the scope of the pandemic. While the pandemic continues we use the tools we have available, which includes the occasional lockdown. Why wouldn’t you do that?
We don’t have to “live with it.” And we will keep up our level of protection until we don’t need to any more. Is it sustainable beyond the scope of the pandemic? Nope. But we don’t have rolling lockdowns here, and we aren’t indefinitely lockdown either. We lockdown when we need to bring an outbreak (or a potential outbreak) under control, and rely on other measures to keep Covid at bay outside of those outbreaks.
So no, I don’t agree with you. We don’t have to learn to live with the virus. Professor Michael Baker, the architect of our Elimination Strategy, says it best:
You really aren’t telling me anything I don’t already know. But here’s the thing. We have options here. We are carefully measuring our next step based on what is happening around the rest of the world. We have already allowed double-vaccinated NZ flight crews to not have to isolate and we have been doing that for a couple of months now. We are cautious, we are following the science, we are opening our borders gradually where we can, and we are doing just fine thanks.
I’m completely lost with who or what you are arguing against now.
You agree that a policy of lockdowns forever is unsustainable but when I make the same point I’m somehow wrong?
…did you only make a single point in this thread?
I clarified what I meant when I said “unsustainable.” I meant unsustainable outside the confines of the pandemic. During the pandemic lockdowns will remain one of the tools that we use to control outbreaks.
You claimed we hadn’t eliminated Covid. I explained that from an epidemiological perspective and in terms of our strategy that we have eliminated Covid, and that you were conflating the terms “elimination” and “eradication”.
You said that we had to learn to live with Covid. I have argued that we don’t have to learn to live with it, and have cited the architect of the NZ elimination strategy who agrees with me.
You said something about continued indefinite lockdowns and when I asked you to clarify you said you meant rolling lockdowns: neither of which are things that we do here. I pointed out what we do here instead, which is localised, targeted lockdowns to isolate potentially infected to allow our contact tracers to identify transmission chains so we can ring-fence the outbreak.
So when you say “I’m completely lost with who or what you are arguing against now”, all I can say is that I’m arguing with you, because you are either saying things that are wrong or saying things I disagree with.
Only “wrong” because you are choosing to misinterpret my words as such.
I’m perfectly willing to accept your own specific use of the word “unsustainable”, a shame you seem unwilling to extend me the same courtesy regarding “elimination”.
As it happens I too was talking about unsustainability outside of the pandemic as I was clearly referring to a future where the virus will become endemic so in any case you still agree with me.
But I’m at the point where it is clear you must be either deliberately misinterpreting what has been said or choosing to interpret words in the most uncharitable way possible. For what reason I cannot fathom.
Others seemed willing to engage in good faith so I’ll just stick to them in future.
…where do you think I’ve misinterpreted your words?
???
Elimination is a technical definition, that (since the pandemic) has entered common usage, especially here in NZ. “Unsustainable” isn’t a technical term but a subjective term, and I conceded that I was misunderstood and I clarified what I meant.
I’ve already accepted you misunderstood. But you seem to think I’m arguing about nothing, when I’ve been arguing with you about specific things. All I did was point these things out to you.
Our government has said they are going to maintain our elimination strategy. That means we will intentionally stomp out any outbreak that happens here, not allowing Covid to become endemic here.
So I don’t see how I’m agreeing with you because I’m not. I have no idea what is going to happen in the rest of the world but what happens in the rest of the world doesn’t have to happen here.
I don’t see why I need to be charitable when you have been uncharitable in your depiction of our strategy.
I’ve engaged you in good faith throughout this entire conversation.
It seems to me that the NZ system is sustainable as long as they are willing to indefinitely, possibly permanently, heavily restrict international travel.
I don’t know how they feel about that.
I can’t let this stand. You are admitting that you are being uncharitable and yet at the same time claiming good faith?
Balls to that, Your implication of my “uncharitable depiction” is imagined. I have levelled precisely zero criticism of what NZ has done, nor what it will do. Neither said it nor implied it.
I haven’t “depicted” your strategy nor referred to it all other than to say that the population of any country will not stand for an indefinite policy of lockdowns in the future. You’ve said so yourself, your leaders have said they want to avoid lockdowns.
I understand that you are protective of your current situation and rightly proud of how NZ have kept their population safe but honestly, it sounds like you are looking for a fight when no-one is offering one but you.