Australian Reports of the Virus Spread

[lovetravellingoz]

That's a bit of hyperbole. All we know is that a family of four had Covid.

Hyperbole?

I think you need to read up on genomic testing if you believe it is hyperbole. The testing was done by the highly regarded Peter Doherty Institute (See https://www.doherty.edu.au/news-events/news/tracking-covid-19-using-genomics).

Tracking COVID-19 in Victoria | Coronavirus Victoria

Genomics and epidemiology are used to track the spread of COVID-19 in Victoria.

www.dhhs.vic.gov.au

• Almost all of the current cases in Victoria (where the sequence is known) are related to the Rydges Hotel cluster. This hotel was used to quarantine individuals returning from overseas. From the genomic and epidemiological data, we know that a family of four who returned from overseas and were quarantining within the hotel, were the first to become unwell in this genomic cluster. Because this family became unwell very shortly after arriving home, it is likely that they acquired infection overseas.
• The Stamford Hotel cluster is the other source of current cases in Victoria. This hotel was also used for quarantine for individuals returning from overseas. From the genomic and epidemiological data, we know that three people who returned home to Australia and were quarantining within the hotel were the first to become unwell in this genomic cluster. It is likely then these people acquired coronavirus overseas. From 21 February to 14 August 2020 there are 110 cases associated with this genomic cluster.
• Of the 5,395 samples of coronavirus that we had genomic data to 14 August, 3,594 are associated with the Rydges Hotel cluster and 110 are associated with the Stamford Hotel cluster.
• More recent data indicates that for the 1,589 cases sequenced from cases with symptom onset from 14 July to 14 August, all but 12 were linked to Rydges. The other 12 cases are linked to the Stamford Hotel cluster. It is likely that 99% of current cases of Covid-19 in Victoria have arisen from the Rydges or Stamford Plaza hotels.

The above is hardly hyerbole. It is fact. Whereas your source of sex with a hotel quarantine guest causing the second wave is?

 

[Pushka]

The hyperbole was in reference to the four family members having sex with the quarantine personnel. As you referenced. Even your response states - "the first people to become unwell". Those people who weren't unwell were never tested. They can still be infectious and have symptoms absent or so slight as to not warrant further testing. It is therefore no stretch whatsoever to question the chain of infection. Unless everyone was tested then there are many permutations.

As Victoria didn't see fit to test everyone there is no complete jigsaw puzzle.

 

[lovetravellingoz]

The hyperbole was in reference to the four family members having sex with the quarantine personnel.
And as they didn't test everyone there is no complete jigsaw puzzle.

It has been reported, with the science to back it up, that the the vast majority cases in Victoria's second wave came from that family of 4 when a live virus can be grown. All the Second Wave Strains are known, both in Vic and interstate. So if you believe that the second wave came from sex with a hotel quarantine guest then it would need to have been be with one of those 4 people. There is the Stamford Strain where it is possible, but the number of cases are very small and so that did not cause the second wave. At best it is a tiny fraction.


So instead of the above it is more plausible to you that a guard had sex with a mystery guest, that this then grew into the second wave with every subsequent positive case from that sex-source never being able to grow a viable virus from the swab sample to allow a genomic sequence. This is to myself highly implausible. Such an occurrence has not shown up in anything I have read about anywhere in the world. If it did, then they would have had an additional strain identified (ie such as say in the NZ Second Wave), of which there is not.

Your logic also ignores that with clusters that they look at the genomic sequencing. If there were repeated whole clusters showing up where no viable genomic testing was possible I would be stunned if no one had remarked on this fact by now.

 

[trevella]

It has been reported, with the science to back it up, that the the vast majority cases in Victoria's second wave came from that family of 4 when a live virus can be grown. All the Second Wave Strains are known, both in Vic and interstate. So if you believe that the second wave came from sex with a hotel quarantine guest then it would need to have been be with one of those 4 people. There is the Stamford Strain where it is possible, but the number of cases are very small and so that did not cause the second wave. At best it is a tiny fraction.


So instead of the above it is more plausible to you that a guard had sex with a mystery guest, that this then grew into the second wave with every subsequent positive case from that sex-source never being able to grow a viable virus from the swab sample to allow a genomic sequence. This is to myself highly implausible. Such an occurrence has not shown up in anything I have read about anywhere in the world. If it did, then they would have had an additional strain identified (ie such as say in the NZ Second Wave), of which there is not.

Your logic also ignores that with clusters that they look at the genomic sequencing. If there were repeated whole clusters showing up where no viable genomic testing was possible I would be stunned if no one had remarked on this fact by now.

Don’t give up your day job, mate.

Even down 99% you must have been better at it than this.

 

[HappyFlyerFamily]

It’s a great chat.

 

[lovetravellingoz]

The hyperbole was in reference to the four family members having sex with the quarantine personnel. As you referenced. Even your response states - "the first people to become unwell". Those people who weren't unwell were never tested. They can still be infectious and have symptoms absent or so slight as to not warrant further testing. It is therefore no stretch whatsoever to question the chain of infection. Unless everyone was tested then there are many permutations.

As Victoria didn't see fit to test everyone there is no complete jigsaw puzzle.

I think you have overlooked that any sample that shows as a positive result gets genomically sequenced. I know NSW does this and I suspect Qld too.

Not all samples can grow the virus and then get matched and so there are missing links. But most are viable.

So with all these many samples none have produced a different strain to the ones identified. What this means is that there are no cases evident in the second wave that have come from a different source than the known ones, whether that be from hotel quarantine, or from any other route (ie airline staff etc). This is why they know that hotel quarantine started the second wave in Victoria.

If an unknown case had of leaked out of quarantine by any means and started a transmission chain, then a new strain would have shown up in those infections. No such new strain has shown up. There is no jigsaw in Victoria with a missing first piece, such as they have with the New Zealand Second Wave.

 

[drron]

Another company unhappy with Victorian DHHS.They did not class those on the same shift as an infected worker were close contacts so the company shouldn't have sent them home to isolate and be tested.

DHHS warns company off asking close COVID contacts to isolate

 

[Pushka]

It has been reported, with the science to back it up

The Science in this case is GIGO. In Victoria, testing for Covid was not mandatory for travellers in quarantine. And we know that 30% refused. But your science will tell us that from only those, at most, 70% of people tested, they can accurately show the pathway of Covid. Security guards weren't tested unless they reported sick. We know of at least two guards who had sex in the quarantine hotels whilst on duty. Were they ever tested? And we all know that many many people show no symptoms or at most a minor cold. So likely never tested.

So many holes in their theory but let's call it science.

Post automatically merged: Sep 14, 2020

I think you have overlooked that any sample that shows as a positive result gets genomically sequenced. I know NSW does this and I suspect Qld too.

Not all samples can grow the virus and then get matched and so there are missing links. But most are viable.

So with all these many samples none have produced a different strain to the ones identified. What this means is that there are no cases evident in the second wave that have come from a different source than the known ones, whether that be from hotel quarantine, or from any other route (ie airline staff etc). This is why they know that hotel quarantine started the second wave in Victoria.

If an unknown case had of leaked out of quarantine by any means and started a transmission chain, then a new strain would have shown up in those infections. No such new strain has shown up. There is no jigsaw in Victoria with a missing first piece, such as they have with the New Zealand Second Wave.

But not everyone was tested because they could refuse to have it in Victoria due to the weird freedom stuff that somehow was allowed in the pandemic so I'm going to prophesy that those who had sex with a security guard would refuse to get tested unless they were extremely unwell.

 

[HappyFlyerFamily]

Based on reporting it seems the Vic judicial enquiry only heard the 99% ‘expert’ opinion. Was there any other contradicting evidence? Did counsel assisting scrutinise? So even though I understand your point, the official response would be lacking and perhaps in your view a miscarriage of justice/waste of money.

.

The Science in this case is GIGO. In Victoria, testing for Covid was not mandatory for travellers in quarantine. And we know that 30% refused. But your science will tell us that from only those, at most, 70% of people tested, they can accurately show the pathway of Covid. Security guards weren't tested unless they reported sick. We know of at least two guards who had sex in the quarantine hotels whilst on duty. Were they ever tested? And we all know that many many people show no symptoms or at most a minor cold. So likely never tested.

So many holes in their theory but let's call it science.

Post automatically merged: Sep 14, 2020

But not everyone was tested because they could refuse to have it in Victoria due to the weird freedom stuff that somehow was allowed in the pandemic so I'm going to prophesy that those who had sex with a security guard would refuse to get tested unless they were extremely unwell.

 

[Pushka]

Based on reporting it seems the Vic judicial enquiry only heard the 99% ‘expert’ opinion. Was there any other contradicting evidence? Did counsel assisting scrutinise? So even though I understand your point, the official response would be lacking and perhaps in your view a miscarriage of justice/waste of money.

.

If a normal court of law was seeking judgement then an effective "defence" (but I'm not sure of the situation in Victorian enquiries) would shoot down such evidence as there is no proven chain of evidence.

Trying to think of a good comparison. I guess in a fantasy situation, if Family of Four was charged by Police with creating the second wave, their defence lawyer would call into question all the other possible scenarios that could have created the second wave, point to all the deficit in information gathering (ie evidence, and in this case that 30% of people refused testing so why should they be held accountable just because they were tested); and thus create sufficient doubt in the minds of Judge and Jury that there is enough evidence to convict them. There just isn't. There are so many potential alternative explanations here.

 

[blackcat20]

I thought there was a human contamination issue in that family's room, which may have been responsible for the outbreak?

 

[Pushka]

I thought there was a human contamination issue in that family's room, which may have been responsible for the outbreak?

Of course, it is a possibility and the explanation put forward. On the other hand there are lots of possibilities and explanations that simply werent explored because people refused the test. So an incomplete investigation.

I was thinking earlier that it reminded me of Azaria Chamberlain. At the get go it was assumed that her mother or father or both, even the kids, were the ones responsible so all the evidence was about how that had happened. And other evidence was completely ignored, such as, a dingo taking the baby and so Lindy was convicted. Shameful.

I think they have simply latched on to a convenienent explanation for the second wave but there is so much left out - and which can never be explored because of the failure to test everyone and get the complete picture..

 

[Lynda2475]

I dont dispute that the family of four is the root source of the majority of the second wave based on genomic tracing, but the spread within and beyond the hotel will have had many contributors. Also i've not read that the Night Manager was definitively patient zero, rather that they were the firs to test positive.

Given the lack of PPE and lax measures in place, it could be that a couple of security guards or other workers such as cleaners, laundry service, hotel staff delivering meals etc all contracted from family innocently i.e. handling sheets/towels, clearing meal trays / emptying bins, luggage, touching surfaces all got covid-19 around the same time, but got tested later (or not at all, if they felt well). If some of the unknowingly infected security guards then also went on to sleep with other hotel guests, then that action could have further spread the virus to other quarantine guests who would have otherwise had no contact with the source family of 4, just as them being out in the community shopping/dinning, car pooling etc all did.

I dont think Pushka was implying security guards sleeping with hotel guest was the first instance of spread, just one real possibility. Given the lack of early testing and speed of spread early on, we dont have great data about exactly whom infected whom in what exact sequence. More recent cases like in Colac, it was clear 1 individual seeded the cluster of 24.

 

[HappyFlyerFamily]

Vic 35 new cases and 7 deaths

 

[HappyFlyerFamily]

Qld 0 new cases, 30 active

 

[jakeseven7]

Vic 35 new cases and 7 deaths

Keep going Victoria, so close now!!

 

[lovetravellingoz]

An interesting article in The Age on Covid19 symptoms in the Victorian Second Wave:


Coughs, sore throats and runny noses are the most common symptoms being detected in Victorians testing positive to coronavirus, with only one in five people presenting with a fever.

While fever is often thought to be a distinctive feature of the virus, data compiled by the state's public health team shows only about 20 per cent of people found to have coronavirus in recent weeks had a high temperature.

Infectious disease physicians suspect this is due to young people, who have been over-represented in the state's second surge of cases, experiencing milder bouts of COVID-19.

"What it suggests to me is that we are seeing a lot more younger people with more milder illness, so a fever may not be as prominent a symptom as it was in the first wave of cases," Australian National University infectious disease expert Professor Sanjaya Senanayake said.

"It also highlights that even if you don't have a fever but you have any kind of acute respiratory infections symptom like sore throat, cough, runny nose, then you should be getting tested."

etc

Only one in five coronavirus-positive Victorians has fever

Infectious disease experts suspect coughs, sore throats and runny noses are the most commonly detected symptoms.

www.theage.com.au

 

[lovetravellingoz]

, but the spread within and beyond the hotel will have had many contributors

100% agree, and I suspect that some of the system shortcomings or failures in what happened after the virus got out of quarantine was more critical to the virus taking off and it becoming the size it did, that the system failures at the hotels themselves.

 

[lovetravellingoz]

Vic Trigger Update

Vic Regional well below 5. Dan commented in today's presser that next step (relaxation) for them is probably now a couple of days away.

Vic Melbourne approaching to 50 trigger level.

 

[p--and--t]

100% agree, and I suspect that some of the system shortcomings or failures in what happened after the virus got out of quarantine was more critical to the virus taking off and it becoming the size it did, that the system failures at the hotels themselves.

I prefer to call them people failures. This is 100% about human behaviour in response (or lack of response) to the virus.