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COVID-19 Stuff Here

WorkingClassRugger

David Codey (61)
Um, the concept of a lockdown is not for what's happening now, it's for what is to come.
Our current mortality rate, which is kind of meaningless due to immature data, is good. 1%.
If we look at a 20% infection rate, in 25 million people that's 5 million getting at some stage over the next 3-6 months maybe. 1% of those die, it's 50 000. Not small.
If 5% of those need acute level care (not you, not most of the people saying "it's not a death sentence") that's 250 000 needing an acute level (read ICU or similar) bed at some point.
We have about 2 000 in Australia.
We can ramp that up to maybe 4000 by using cardiac ICU, neurosurgical ICU and tasking a lot of operating theatre ventilators to create ICU level beds.
Then we need acute care nurses to staff them, intensivists to oversee it (anaesthetists will be recruited, in Italy even people like me - surgeons - were all brought in), more equipment to replace parts that fail.
250 000 into 4 000 needs to be really spread out to work.
Now, admittedly it might end up better than that. I hope so. Maybe infection rates will plateau, although it would buck the trend from most other countries based on the measures we are, and are not, undertaking.
Don't forget in all this the rationalisation of other medical care - the UK are triaging Urological cancers with the aim that many will be on surveillance for up to 6 months which would normally be treated within 1-3 months. Can't speak for other specialties.
And hope the usual run of acute patients requiring ICU for all the normal stuff that happens somehow disappear. They won't.
Sorry to be a downer, but I think there is far too much complacency going on right now. Witness the AFL and NRL. Spoke to my sister in Ireland tonight - they shut all the pubs and people basically went, "OK, probably makes sense". Here we have pubs, restaurants, bars and cafes plugging along. She'll be right.


Yep. Looking at the data and some people's comments that we are doing ok and kind of wondering are they reading the same thng as I am. Because at present that curve doesn't seem to be flattening. It would appear that we're entering the exponential growth period.

In regards to Ireland. They've also locked down the hospitals. My aunt had until recently spent 10 weeks in hospital for liver failure (which she seems to have made an almost biblical recovery from) when right near her leaving all family and friends were restricted from visiting. She was able to go home duri ng this but isn't allowed to leave the house. At all.
 

Braveheart81

Will Genia (78)
Staff member
Yep. Looking at the data and some people's comments that we are doing ok and kind of wondering are they reading the same thng as I am. Because at present that curve doesn't seem to be flattening. It would appear that we're entering the exponential growth period.


Tracking slightly better than some countries where things are completely fucked seems like a very low bar that we shouldn't be getting excited about.

Good thing we are playing NRL and AFL games and letting the casinos keep operating to try and catch up with some of the countries where things are far worse.
 

WorkingClassRugger

David Codey (61)
I'll start with, I agree that we will need a lockdown period to help relive the health care system.

But let's play out the lockdown game. If Scomo placed Australia in lockdown as of Wednesday for only non essential people. What happens next? How long should we be in lockdown? Is it for two weeks, or is it until a vaccine is ready? Who looks after the Nurses, the cleaners, the truck drivers shipping the food around, the people packing food into the trucks kids? How far down the supply line do we go in lockdown for?

The way I can see a full lockdown playing out is, you just shift when it runs rampant in Australia unless we are in lockdown till the vaccine. If we go in lockdown and wait out for this batch (and those infected but not knowingly) to recover. All it will take is a handful of people flying in and we're back at the start again.

I don't think a lockdown is a simple yes answer. I agree we will need it if it gets bad.


We might need to make a hard decision around international travel and a lockdown. As in. We may need to implement a prolonged ban on entry to the country in order to prevent any imported cases reigniting the outbreak. As for the lockdown period. I'd dare say a fortnight wouldn't be enough. Assuming people are still contracting it on the last day before quarantine going from reports the average incubation period is 5.5 days with 1% presenting beyond the 14 day period. So you kind of have to wait out that 1% in terms of presenting. And then you need to give them at least a fortnight to run the course.

So, in order to potentially wait out the virus I'd imagine somewhere in the vicinity of 4-6 weeks may be necessary.

As for when to do this. Personally, I would actually prefer to see it earlier rather than later. We shouldn't be waiting until it gets so bad that the health care system is on the verge of buckling under the weight. I would have liked to suggest when we got to 1k that we'd pull the trigger but at the rate we're heading we'll likely hit that by Monday. So I reckon it should be no more than 1500-2000.

But again. I think we'll crash through those as well. Mainly because the Coalition are so lost in their own narrative of being economic managers that the idea of locking down the country in order to reduce infection rates and death is terrifying despite most people at least from my interaction being supportive of more extreme measures.
 

WorkingClassRugger

David Codey (61)
Tracking slightly better than some countries where things are completely fucked seems like a very low bar that we shouldn't be getting excited about.

Good thing we are playing NRL and AFL games and letting the casinos keep operating to try and catch up with some of the countries where things are far worse.


And schools. Don't forget the schools. Because haven't you heard. Kids don't get it. Or at least not en masse. Or at least not here. Yet. We're just following in the example of Singapore. Except we're not. Not really. We don't do daily temperature checks and actually implement proper social distancing measures in schools. But yeah. She'll be right.
 

Slim 293

Stirling Mortlock (74)
A stay at home order has been issued to the entire state of California from the Governor.........
 

Up the Guts

Steve Williams (59)
So, in order to potentially wait out the virus I'd imagine somewhere in the vicinity of 4-6 weeks may be necessary.

I don't think it is possible to wait out the virus. You can lockdown periodically in shorter increments to slow the spread and ease the strain on the healthcare system but if you locked everyone away for 4-6 weeks from Monday, it would just spread again at some point after that and you are back to square one. That's assuming you can lock down people for 4-6 weeks, I don't think there's any chance in locking down 25 million people for 6 weeks.

And at some point, you have to start looking into the relative cost of locking everyone down. In the US a 1% increase in the unemployment rate is roughly equal to 40 000 deaths. The costs of a financial crisis are not just economic.
 

WorkingClassRugger

David Codey (61)
So far there has been 40,651 tests conducted in NSW. With 363 positive. Still less than 1% of all tested. So that's at least encouraging at this point.
 

WorkingClassRugger

David Codey (61)
I don't think it is possible to wait out the virus. You can lockdown periodically in shorter increments to slow the spread and ease the strain on the healthcare system but if you locked everyone away for 4-6 weeks from Monday, it would just spread again at some point after that and you are back to square one. That's assuming you can lock down people for 4-6 weeks, I don't think there's any chance in locking down 25 million people for 6 weeks.


You're probably right. You're not likely going to be able to lockdown everyone for 4-6 weeks. But if you can lockdown most of them then you can have a marked impact on the spread. I think I posted it on this thread earlier but accoridng to the Washington Post using a theoretical virus that was twice as contagious as COVID-19 is. The most effective means of flattening the curve was to cut down the number of actors moving about down to 1 in 8 at any one time.

Which could be what may need to happen. Staged lockdowns over set periods for people.
 

Braveheart81

Will Genia (78)
Staff member
Maybe we should test a random group of 1,000 people in Sydney and see what the results are.

Would be interesting to see what the results are. It should come back with less positive cases than the 1% we have seen so far.
 

Aurelius

Ted Thorn (20)
I don't think it is possible to wait out the virus. You can lockdown periodically in shorter increments to slow the spread and ease the strain on the healthcare system but if you locked everyone away for 4-6 weeks from Monday, it would just spread again at some point after that and you are back to square one. That's assuming you can lock down people for 4-6 weeks, I don't think there's any chance in locking down 25 million people for 6 weeks.


Yeah, if the panic buying and hoarding is bad now imagine how bad it'll get if the prospect of a six-week lockdown becomes imminent.

I think there should be more resources put into enforcing self-isolation cases but locking down the entire country (or even a large portion of it) this early in the piece - well, we'll have to come off lockdown eventually and then we'd just be back to square one.
 

Ignoto

John Thornett (49)
And at some point, you have to start looking into the relative cost of locking everyone down.

Makes you wonder why we don't lock up the inverse, ie the currently sick and 65+ year olds! Smaller subset and more easily identifiable!
 

cyclopath

George Smith (75)
Staff member
Makes you wonder why we don't lock up the inverse, ie the currently sick and 65+ year olds! Smaller subset and more easily identifiable!

About limiting infection numbers. Highest groups for positive tests are 30s, 50s and 20s in that order in Oz.
 

Ignoto

John Thornett (49)
About limiting infection numbers. Highest groups for positive tests are 30s, 50s and 20s in that order in Oz.

Sure, but those groups also have the lowest mortality rate. Wouldn't letting this group 'safely' build up an immunity to it in the long run have a positive impact on those most vulnerable?
 

Sully

Tim Horan (67)
Staff member
Sure, but those groups also have the lowest mortality rate. Wouldn't letting this group 'safely' build up an immunity to it in the long run have a positive impact on those most vulnerable?
Who says you can build up an immunity?
 

WorkingClassRugger

David Codey (61)
Yeah, if the panic buying and hoarding is bad now imagine how bad it'll get if the prospect of a six-week lockdown becomes imminent.

I think there should be more resources put into enforcing self-isolation cases but locking down the entire country (or even a large portion of it) this early in the piece - well, we'll have to come off lockdown eventually and then we'd just be back to square one.


How so? Legitimate question. COVID-19 doesn't live on surfaces indefinitely. So the only way it could occur would be person to person at a point in that period. And the idea behind an extended lockdown would be having it long enough so that all of the current and future cases within that time frame would have their chance to run their course.

People are at home. They get sick. Call authorities and they could come to the houses to test. If by week 6 most people who do emerge as contracting the virus have tested negative then it's dropped for everyone if not those still positive maintain it for another fortnight. In theory this would reduce the numbers of infected. If those with the infection run their course and a free of it and during that period the live virus that was on surfaces is long dead then where will it resurface? International travel. Well, the maintain the border controls until the end of the year.

I seriously would like your thoughts on the above. Just some data to mill over. https://www.forbes.com/sites/joshua...oronavirus-in-a-matter-of-weeks/#2d5170b612e1
 

Froggy

John Solomon (38)
Again, while probably an idealist situation from a medical point of view, the risk is the cure being worse than the disease. Don't get me wrong, I am certainly not of the 'let it take it's course and develop herd immunity' school, but I think you would be surprised how few small businesses would survive six weeks with zero income, on top of the much reduced income both before and after the lock-down.

We are already in a situation where many businesses in the hospitality and tourism sectors are on the brink. Have a look at the stats as to the proportion of the workforce these sectors alone employ. Putting a significant minority of the workforce into long term unemployment leads to poverty, and as I've said before, the social problems associated with a significant minority in genuine poverty will way outlast the Corona virus
 

WorkingClassRugger

David Codey (61)
Again, while probably an idealist situation from a medical point of view, the risk is the cure being worse than the disease. Don't get me wrong, I am certainly not of the 'let it take it's course and develop herd immunity' school, but I think you would be surprised how few small businesses would survive six weeks with zero income, on top of the much reduced income both before and after the lock-down.

We are already in a situation where many businesses in the hospitality and tourism sectors are on the brink. Have a look at the stats as to the proportion of the workforce these sectors alone employ. Putting a significant minority of the workforce into long term unemployment leads to poverty, and as I've said before, the social problems associated with a significant minority in genuine poverty will way outlast the Corona virus


I absolutely understand where you're coming from. A lockdown will be devastating for many small business owners. But so will an extended environment of fear and uncertainty that will exist through the next 6 (and this is the best case scenario by the way) months. A lot will depend on the upcoming 'stimulus' package, though now as per a discussion on ABC it's more a survival package, offers.
 
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