Australian Reports of the Virus Spread

[p--and--t]

And the city with the largest number of Kiwis, outside of Auckland would be Sydney.

They're everywhere. I'm sure many cities in AU would be thinking they have the most

[Disclosure: I have AU resident NZ relatives]

[I don't doubt the statement, but Is there a reference to substantiate the claimed fact?]

 

[HappyFlyerFamily]

Just on the Step 3 for Melbourne.

If the five mystery cases in total over the last 14 days. requirement remains then this looks to be the requirement that will determine when Step 3 in Melbourne occurs as we will soon be under the 14 day average of 50 requirement.

On the 14 day measures mystery cases are about 11 % of 14 day cases. If that % remained it would mean that 14 day cases would need to have dropped to about 55 cases. (Last 14 days is 741 cases).

I believe Step 3 for Melbourne has the following requirements:
1. 14-day average of daily new cases of below 5 (State-wide) - not 50 as stated above and Statewide, not just Melbourne.
2. Less than 5 community transmission (mystery case) over the past 14 days (State-wide)
3. Soft date 26 October 2020

As you reported from DHHS Twitter this morning, today’s the Statewide community transmission is 83 (presumably over the past 14 days - I’ve not had a chance to review info from today’s press conference)

 

[DC3]

They're everywhere. I'm sure many cities in AU would be thinking they have the most

[Disclosure: I have AU resident NZ relatives]

[I don't doubt the statement, but Is there a reference to substantiate the claimed fact?]

Just try walking around Bondi Beach sometime, as it’s where most swim ashore.

 

[p--and--t]

Just try walking around Bondi Beach sometime, as it’s where most swim ashore.

Sh... they must be tired, that's a long distance. Further than Cuba to Florida

 

[HappyFlyerFamily]

I get the feeling in my bones that there won’t be a travel bubble with NZ for the next 6 months

Australia will welcome people from NZ under the hotspot rule, so no need to isolate/quarantine. For travelers from Australia to NZ, there will be a 14-day quarantine required (probably payable by Australian citizens, but not NZ citizens). They will probably need to have NZ only planes and designated planes for transit passengers.

WA probably want the Federal Government to pay for State quarantine lol. But as noted by others probably currently half of it is State border quarantine, once that dries up (March 2021?) then hotels may be in two minds , take interstate + NZ holiday makers or international quarantine.

Oh and my impression is that the quarantine charge to travellers does not cover the entire hotel costs.

 

[lovetravellingoz]

I believe Step 3 for Melbourne has the following requirements:
1. 14-day average of daily new cases of below 5 (State-wide) - not 50 as stated above and Statewide, not just Melbourne.
2. Less than 5 community transmission (mystery case) over the past 14 days (State-wide)

Yes sorry 50 was a typo (now corrected), it was meant to be 5 per day average and so 70 new cases for the 14 days.

I think 1. on current trends is very doable. 2. Is the problematic one.

3. Soft date 26 October 2020

As you reported from DHHS Twitter this morning, today’s the Statewide community transmission is 83 (presumably over the past 14 days - I’ve not had a chance to review info from today’s press conference)

Yesterday's verified report was

The total number of cases from an unknown source in the last 14 days is 94 for metropolitan Melbourne and three for regional Victoria. The 14-day period for the source of acquisition data ends 48 hours earlier than the 14-day period used to calculate the new case average due to the time required to fully investigate a case and assign its mode of acquisition.

So that was 97 statewide. Today was 83 (verified report still to be issued for the day). So that is 14 less.

In a week the unknown statewide cases has dropped from 192 to 83. (See tables below)

So it is heading in the right direction direction and hopefully will continue to rapidly drop. But it is still a fair way off less than 5 unknown cases statewide for 14 days.

 

[antycbr]

While I understand what you are saying, and why you are saying it, the other issue is that there is a very large "shared" population between Australia and NZ.

There is something like 0.6 million Kiwis in Oz (which is a lot when the population of NZ is 4.9 million) and about 70,000 Aussies in NZ. Add to that Kiwis who have Aussie partners in both countries. So even without travel for leisure and business there is a large number of people that would like to travel between the two countries.

So while it would be useful for New Zealanders to fly elsewhere, it does not assist with that strong Australia-NZ connection and need for interchange.

So if you don’t sign up to the hotspot definition then your state remains excluded from trans Tasman arrangements. Simple.

 

[jakeseven7]

Yes sorry 50 was a typo (now corrected), it was meant to be 5 per day average and so 70 new cases for the 14 days.

I think 1. on current trends is very doable. 2. Is the problematic one.




Yesterday's verified report was

The total number of cases from an unknown source in the last 14 days is 94 for metropolitan Melbourne and three for regional Victoria. The 14-day period for the source of acquisition data ends 48 hours earlier than the 14-day period used to calculate the new case average due to the time required to fully investigate a case and assign its mode of acquisition.

So that was 97 statewide. Today was 83 (verified report still to be issued for the day). So that is 14 less.

In a week the unknown statewide cases has dropped from 192 to 83. (See tables below)

So it is heading in the right direction direction and hopefully will continue to rapidly drop. But it is still a fair way off less than 5 unknown cases statewide for 14 days.


View attachment 227467

NSW isn't even achieving point 2....

 

[Lynda2475]

And the city with the largest number of Kiwis, outside of Auckland would be Sydney

A quick Google indicates that "As at 30 June 2018, there were an estimated 568,000 New Zealand-born people living in Australia, forming 2.3 per cent of the population and representing our fourth-largest migrant community. "

Wikipedia (albeit with 2017 data) indicates that Qld has the most kiwis (must like the warm weather): "More New Zealand-born people in Australia were concentrated in Queensland than any other state, with more than half of those in Queensland living in the city of Brisbane. New South Wales was home to the second largest Kiwi-born population with 114,231 people of which 81,064 were located in its largest city, Sydney.[24] The third largest population was found in the state of Victoria with 80,235 people.[2] The state of Western Australia had the fourth largest population with 70,735 people of which 33,751 were located in the city of Perth.[25] "

 

[Lynda2475]

NSW isn't even achieving point 2

In an interview i was listening to this morning, Mary Louise McClaws from WHO was stating "less than 4 community transmission cases per day for a 14 day period" should be the threshold for all states opening the border to NSW. We are getting close to that now.

Per the SMH.com.au:

Infectious disease expert Mary-Louise McLaws has told Today she does not believe NSW needs to reach zero community transmission to – as Premier Gladys Berejiklian continues to say – be "out of the woods".

The UNSW professor said keeping daily numbers lower than four cases a day would indicate success in virus management

"[NSW are potentially on track to zero but to be out of the woods you don't necessarily have to have zero but you do have to have between zero and four cases every day for twice an average incubation period," she said. "That average incubation period is 14 days."

 

[I love to travel]

I quite liked Labour RAAF plane proposal. Passengers would need to contribute $$ but seems a reliable way to stagger arrivals and increase numbers at the same time. We are paying for ADF personell anyway so lets use them.

 

[Lynda2475]

I quite liked Labour RAAF plane proposal. Passengers would need to contribute $$ but seems a reliable way to stagger arrivals and increase numbers at the same time. We are paying for ADF personell anyway so lets use them.

Im guessing you never flown in a RAAF troop transport plane (Hercules or the like) - its noisy and uncomfortable, wouldn't want to do it long haul. The issue isnt flight capacity, commercial airlines will fly more if they can put more bums on seats, but arrival caps in most states means they can only have 50 passengers or so per flight - which is why they are prioritising business fares and freight to make some money.

To allow more people to come home, we need to increase the hotel quarantine capacity - that means getting Victoria taking arrivals again, asking QLD/WA/SA to up their intake (Queensland in particular has capacity to take a lot more than 500 a week) and asking NT/ACT/Tas to take some flights too.

 

[p--and--t]

I quite liked Labour RAAF plane proposal. Passengers would need to contribute $$ but seems a reliable way to stagger arrivals and increase numbers at the same time. We are paying for ADF personell anyway so lets use them.

We are not just paying for the personnel, we are paying for the planes to make regular flights for the purpose of maintaining crew currency and plane readiness for use - so fuel and maintenance (as well as labour) for just in case rather than useful purposes.

 

[p--and--t]

Im guessing you never flown in a RAAF troop transport plane (Hercules or the like) - its noisy and uncomfortable, wouldn't want to do it long haul. The issue isnt flight capacity, commercial airlines will fly more if they can put more bums on seats, but arrival caps in most states means they can only have 50 passengers or so per flight - which is why they are prioritising business fares and freight to make some money.

To allow more people to come home, we need to increase the hotel quarantine capacity - that means getting Victoria taking arrivals again, asking QLD/WA/SA to up their intake (Queensland in particular has capacity to take a lot more than 500 a week) and asking NT/ACT/Tas to take some flights too.

Ar least some of the RAAF planes would be as comfortable as a typical SYD-MEL service, others not so much.

There is one pollie pushing for CNS to be made a quaro hub. Thousands of unemployed hotel & F&B staff, 6,500 hotels, many of which could do with some guests.

 

[jeza]

I laughed when he was emphasizing that WA take the second largest number when it is 1/5 of what NSW take (and NSW also have Victorian arrivals in hotel quarantine), he just wants to reduce costs and deflect attention away from his hard border decision impacting the economy. Im sure all those other empty hotels would be glad of some extra revenue.

Post automatically merged: Sep 15, 2020

WA Premier is currently in no hurry to open the border, as relative to other states the economy is doing ok. They are still forecasting a budget surplus due to the increased mining royalties.

 

[HappyFlyerFamily]

In an interview i was listening to this morning, Mary Louise McClaws from WHO was stating "less than 4 community transmission cases per day for a 14 day period" should be the threshold for all states opening the border to NSW. We are getting close to that now.

Per the SMH.com.au:

Infectious disease expert Mary-Louise McLaws has told Today she does not believe NSW needs to reach zero community transmission to – as Premier Gladys Berejiklian continues to say – be "out of the woods".

The UNSW professor said keeping daily numbers lower than four cases a day would indicate success in virus management

"[NSW are potentially on track to zero but to be out of the woods you don't necessarily have to have zero but you do have to have between zero and four cases every day for twice an average incubation period," she said. "That average incubation period is 14 days."

Another shocker by Professor McLaws of UNSW and member of WHO panel.

 

[dajop]

To allow more people to come home, we need to increase the hotel quarantine capacity -

Or have better risk management. I'm just looking at what Singapore does:
1) Very low risk - test on arrival, and quarantined until test results available. If test results negative - then release into community (NZ, Brunei)
2) Low risk - wearable tracking device issued on arrival, self quarantine at home or self organised hotel for 7 days, tested on Day 7 and released if negative (Australia*, Macau, Mainland China, Taiwan, Vietnam, Malaysia) nb: Japan, Hong Kong, Victoria & South Korea were moved out of this after their second waves started
3) Everyone else - 14 day quarantine in dedicated facilities.
* excluding Victoria

This is based on a declaration that you need to list all locations you've been in during 14 days prior to arrival. ( The advantage SG has if they find you lie on the declaration, your life as you know it is over - i.e. citizens probably jailed, others have their right to reside in SG revoked).

 

[jakeseven7]

WA Premier is currently in no hurry to open the border, as relative to other states the economy is doing ok. They are still forecasting a budget surplus due to the increased mining royalties.

He is just fluffing as has already been discussed many times on here because all that ‘doing well’ is only on paper mining $. It doesn’t trickle through the WA economy all that much.

Any business that relies on movement of people, tourism, business visitors, conventions, hospitality and all their suppliers up and down stream etc etc have been decimated and jobs with it - being propped up by Jobkeeper only. They try and raise it via bodies like the chamber of commerce and get screamed down by the government.

Once Jobkeeper goes, WA will need every cent of their little surplus to replace it with a WA state funded version of Jobkeeper if they still think being closed to states like Tasmania, SA, NT, ACT and probably and hopefully NSW/ACT/VIC by that time is still too dangerous.... Even though their CHO has advised against being closed to SA/NT/TAS already but you know listen to whoever wins you your election is the in thing these days.

 

[HappyFlyerFamily]

Curfew lawsuit...courtesy news blog

But now, the Victorian Premier might not have a choice: documents were filed in Victoria's Supreme Court this afternoon by Marcus Clarke QC to have the curfew removed.

Mornington Peninsula cafe owner and single mother-of-three Michelle Loielo, who filed the suit, has accused the curfew of violating her rights to freedom, liberty and security.

"Since the implementation of the curfew I would describe the home environment for my children and I as absolutely suffocating," she said in an affidavit filed with the court.

"Looking after the mental and emotional wellbeing of my children, coupled with the pressure of trying to keep my business afloat, has taken a significant toll on my health.

"The social isolation from my family and friends has been unbearable."

Ms Loielo has asked the Supreme Court to either rule the curfew unlawful, or quash the Stay At Home Directions that stipulate it.

The court documents argue Victoria's deputy public health commander Michelle Giles "failed to give any real independent consideration to whether it was appropriate to make the curfew", AAP reports.

They also claim the curfew direction is invalid on grounds of irrationality and illogicality and that the curfew is not reasonably proportionate nor based on relevant and reliable evidence in line with public health laws.

 

[antycbr]

Im guessing you never flown in a RAAF troop transport plane (Hercules or the like) - its noisy and uncomfortable, wouldn't want to do it long haul. The issue isnt flight capacity, commercial airlines will fly more if they can put more bums on seats, but arrival caps in most states means they can only have 50 passengers or so per flight - which is why they are prioritising business fares and freight to make some money.

To allow more people to come home, we need to increase the hotel quarantine capacity - that means getting Victoria taking arrivals again, asking QLD/WA/SA to up their intake (Queensland in particular has capacity to take a lot more than 500 a week) and asking NT/ACT/Tas to take some flights too.

There is no need for RAAF services and the negotiation of landing and transit rights for military registered aircraft takes more time than fixing the flight cap as well as improving the viability of the current international pax services which is now in doubt.

If we want to activate CNS or Howard Springs in the NT, simply task the RAAF to fly from the international arrival port such as SYD to CNS or DRW/Tindal with the quarantine pax, or ask QR/SQ to operate via these ports or direct - eg Silkair flew to CNS and DRW before.