Coronavirus - worldwide spread and control

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Rosie said:
Over the last week we have learned of 2 cases where they have left New Zealand and arrived in another country and tested positive for the corona virus.
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Fortunately it seems likely that both were the sort of cases who get infected, recover, but then test positive again months later because their body is shedding inactive bits of virus. So, hopefully, a false alarm (crosses fingers and toes :nailbiting:).
Rosie said:
our community testing is down, people are not going to get tested and GP's are getting a lot of refusals from patients to be tested
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But this does worry me and as for the eejits refusing tests :mad:! You only have to look at Melbourne to see how quickly things can go from basically no problem to out of control.
 
So many mixed messages being sent - I'd be absolutely fuming if I wasn't already.
People shielding against coronavirus can now leave their home and return to work, as a further easing of lockdown restrictions in England is postponed.

More than two million at high risk will no longer need to isolate in most of England, Scotland and Northern Ireland.

It comes after the PM applied the brakes to easing restrictions further and as some businesses remain closed.

England's chief medical officer warned the UK may have reached the limit on lifting lockdown as cases rise.

Prof Chris Whitty said the "idea that we can open up everything and keep the virus under control" is wrong.
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https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-53618776
 
At wednesday Hurtigruten (small cruise shop going along the coast of Norway, although this ship is special made to go in arctic waters and take tourist on a cruise to Svalbard) was notified that one of their previous passenger had tested positive for covid-19.

Yesterday the ship let all of their passengers (a different group than that of the passenger with confirmed covid19) aboard in Tromsø, while two of its crew were sent to the city hospital in a taxi. The two crewmembers had been in isolation and had not shown signs of covid-19 illness. However, they tested positive and today 29 other crew members also tested positive. 60 passengers that had not already left Tromsø are stuck here because they have to quarantine for 10 days, but many had already travelled home (or just been around Tromsø). Taxi drivers have been put in quarantine as they might have transported passengers (and then there's the guy who drove the crewmembers).

Now passengers from two voyages and the whole crew is quarantined, more than 60 muncipalities in Norway have inhabitants that have been on the ship.

Hurtigruten is sorry this have happened, but explains that the crew members did not show sign of covid infection and when they were told about the passenger that had become sick they concluded s/he had not been infected on the cruise as no one else in that travel group were ill. Thus, they did not have reason to not let people aboard in Tromsø.

It escalated quickly, to say the least. Hope none of the passengers are ill.
 
For those who, like me, might be interested in the social historical contexts to epidemics and where SARS-Co-V-2 fits within them, you might find this long-ish piece from the Boston Review interesting:

These two faces of an epidemic, the biological and the social, are closely intertwined, but they are not the same. The biological epidemic can shut down daily life by sickening and killing people, but the social epidemic also shuts down daily life by overturning basic premises of sociality, economics, governance, discourse, interaction—and killing people in the process as well. There is a risk, as we know from both the Spanish influenza of 1918–19 and the more recent swine flu of 2008–9, of relaxing social responses before the biological threat has passed. But there is also a risk in misjudging a biological threat based on faulty models or bad data and in disrupting social life in such a way that the restrictions can never properly be taken back. We have seen in the case of coronavirus the two faces of the epidemic escalating on local, national, and global levels in tandem, but the biological epidemic and the social epidemic don’t necessarily recede on the same timeline.

For these sorts of reasons we must step back and reflect in detail on what we mean by ending in the first place. The history of epidemic endings has taken many forms, and only a handful of them have resulted in the elimination of a disease.
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As they point out, HIV, polio, and TB (which @Jonathan Edwards has spoken about here from time to time) are among those epidemics that have not been eliminated but merely forgotten about by those in the Global North. As @anciendaze @mango @Rosie @strategist @lunarainbows and others have been showing on this forum over the course of the current Sars-Co-V-2 epidemic, local politics can often constrain the work of science in responding to epidemics, which the writers of this essay discuss. Which then can cause lasting socio-political changes/damage. Long story short: epidemics rarely have a tidy ending.

How, then, are we to know when epidemics end? How does the act of looking back aid us in determining a way forward? Historians make poor futurologists, but we spend a lot of time thinking about time. And epidemics produce their own kinds of time, in both biological and social domains, disrupting our individual senses of passing days as well as conventions for collective behavior. They carry within them their own tempos and rhythms: the slow initial growth, the explosive upward limb of the outbreak, the slowing of transmission that marks the peak, plateau, and the downward limb. This falling action is perhaps best thought of as asymptotic: rarely disappearing, but rather fading to the point where signal is lost in the noise of the new normal—and even allowed to be forgotten.
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Just heard news from my family in Melbourne. Those of you who haven't heard, the State of Victoria (where Melbourne is) did a pretty tight lockdown in March and managed to get their cases into very small numbers - a couple a day. But over the last month there has been a great surge of cases, which are believed to be connected with security workers working in the quarantine hotels. Result is disaster, 700+ new cases in the State today (population is around 6 million I think).

They have gone into a second lockdown. Its a crucial time. Can they swing this around and get control of the virus at this late stage? Or will they go the way of Europe, and just end up slowing the spread so as not to stress the health services? This is a situation we should all be watching. I think turnaround may still be possible, but only if the lockdown is hard.

Some of my family members, although alarmed at the increase in daily deaths, still think that lockdown should be softish so as not to hurt those on hourly wages. But surely they will suffer more in the long term if the State doesn't go hard right now? If I had my way, I'd close everything except the supermarkets, medical services, pharmacies, police and emergency services. But it doesn't sound like that's going to happen. My mum is 84 :(.

Sorry to those whose situations are way, way worse. Surges notwithstanding, I realise the antipodes are still very fortunate.
 
Jonathan Edwards said:
I think that must be right. Turnaround is easy at any stage, never too late - but lockdown has to be maximum. Soft lockdown is a disaster because it produces exactly the opposite effect to that intended.
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Do you agree with these restrictions, including the curfew?

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-08-02/victorias-latest-coronavirus-restrictions-explained/12516182

I suspect the surge in Victoria was due to non-compliance with existing restrictions, rather than a lack of restriction severity. People not self-isolating when experiencing the initial mild symptoms in particular.

As little as a year ago, I expressed concern to various people about why mild infections seem far more common recently than they did 10-20 years ago, and apart from increased international travel, I suggested it was due to increased casualisation of the workforce along with cultural expectations that it is 'weak' not to go to work when you have a mild cold - and bosses likewise were not understanding of the need to take time off work in such cases. More than one person thought I was silly for suggesting people need to stay at home with mild colds. These attitudes do not disappear overnight and not everyone is connected, or has the English language skills to remain aware of these constantly changing laws.
I suggest that it is not just the laws, but the ability of the government to communicate how and why that matters. Mandatory mask laws without distributing high quality masks and communicating how using a mask incorrectly can lead to spread for example, would have been helpful - but wasn't done. Many people were saying, how am I to get a mask when they're sold out? The replies were, oh, just make one, use a scarf etc. But scarfs and most cloth masks are not effective in general for protecting the wearer.
 
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Numbers in Germany are spiking again and people are protesting against lockdown rules.

Yesterday was most likely the hottest day of the year...I wish that I could go protest for the matters important to me. I can't help but to envy their health and condemn their recklessness.

Health privilege is real and I miss the ignorance that comes with it.

So far, outside protests don't seem to cause huge spikes in infections, so I cross my fingers for them and all of us.
 
Snow Leopard said:
Do you agree with these restrictions, including the curfew?
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I don't know what information is available but my general thought is that the more localised the infection is, as seems to be in Melbourne, the stronger the argument for every restriction you can think of.

Governments do not seem to understand that as cases get fewer and more local the argument for restriction gets STRONGER because the chances of elimination from an area become real. The pattern of easing restrictions as cases reduce is back to front.
 
Jonathan Edwards said:
I think that must be right. Turnaround is easy at any stage, never too late - but lockdown has to be maximum. Soft lockdown is a disaster because it produces exactly the opposite effect to that intended.
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What seems to be happening is that we are getting the worst of both worlds. Lockdown is an economic disaster but worth it if the virus numbers go down, but everywhere they are going back to normal life too soon so more people are getting ill, but the economy is taking another hit.

Being very, very careful with masks and hygiene would let businesses start making money but people are going crazy to get back to normal life and making normal life less likley.
 
Three passengers from the ship have now tested positive, all are already in their home muncipalities. One had attented the local hospital and three staff members are now in quarantine.

My university has so far given little information about how the semester will be when we start, except that the normal speeches for all the new students will be cancelled and instead there will be individual start-up meetings for each class. As much as possible will be done on campus, but "if the situation changes, we are prepared to go digital". I'm not looking forward to taking the bus to campus, although I have a mask (not recommended in Norway, and we are told to not use the bus if it's impossible to upheld required distance, but that's not exactly possible unless it's okay to not show up on time).. Not like I was planning on showing up on more than I have to, but I don't exactly want things to get out of control. We have been lucky so far in Norway.
 
Michelle said:
For those who, like me, might be interested in the social historical contexts to epidemics and where SARS-Co-V-2 fits within them, you might find this long-ish piece from the Boston Review interesting:
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Reading this makes me kind of weep for what a smart and competent BPS model could have been and how powerful it would be. Also that epidemiology is basically a biosocial framework of health. Amazing what you can do when you don't carry dead weight, Week-end at Freud's style.
 
New Evidence Suggests Young Children Spread Covid-19 More Efficiently Than Adults
Two new studies, though from different parts of the world, have arrived at the same conclusion: that young children not only transmit SARS-CoV-2 efficiently, but may be major drivers of the pandemic as well.

The first, which was published in JAMA yesterday, reports findings from a pediatric hospital in Chicago, Illinois. The second, a preprint manuscript awaiting peer review, was conducted in the mountainous province of Trento, Italy.
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https://www.forbes.com/sites/willia...19-more-efficiently-than-adults/#79fa9ff219fd
 
Woolie said:
Just heard news from my family in Melbourne. Those of you who haven't heard, the State of Victoria (where Melbourne is) did a pretty tight lockdown in March and managed to get their cases into very small numbers - a couple a day. But over the last month there has been a great surge of cases, which are believed to be connected with security workers working in the quarantine hotels. Result is disaster, 700+ new cases in the State today (population is around 6 million I think).

They have gone into a second lockdown. Its a crucial time. Can they swing this around and get control of the virus at this late stage? Or will they go the way of Europe, and just end up slowing the spread so as not to stress the health services? This is a situation we should all be watching. I think turnaround may still be possible, but only if the lockdown is hard.

Some of my family members, although alarmed at the increase in daily deaths, still think that lockdown should be softish so as not to hurt those on hourly wages. But surely they will suffer more in the long term if the State doesn't go hard right now? If I had my way, I'd close everything except the supermarkets, medical services, pharmacies, police and emergency services. But it doesn't sound like that's going to happen.
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What is happening in Melbourne, as I understand it, is:

* no socialising outside the home, schools and universities, restaurants and bars closed;
* only one walk per day, within a 5km radius of home;
* masks to be worn outside when walking;
* spacing in shops; and
* (last night) curfew 8pm to 5am.

But I was shocked to learn that many non-essential businesses are still doing business. Like hardware shops! And restaurants and fast food places can do home delivery! It seems to me with a daily incidence of 700+, there'll be enough staff within these businesses to form a pretty decent vector for perpetuation - as each person passes on what they acquired from the workplace to their households - and back again, if more than one person in a household is still working. Add to that the small risk of leakage at every site of customer-staff interaction (e.g., people touching stuff at the hardware shop) and you've still got a real risk.
 
Hardware shops *are* essentials. In the UK, at least, they've been one of the few places where you can get masks, cleaning and sanitising products, not to mention bits and bobs for doing vital household repairs such as lightbulbs, electricals and plumbing, any of which could be a threat to health if not dealt with. And people do need to eat - or is everyone in Oz a capable cook?
 
Wits_End said:
Hardware shops *are* essentials. In the UK, at least, they've been one of the few places where you can get masks, cleaning and sanitising products, not to mention bits and bobs for doing vital household repairs such as lightbulbs, electricals and plumbing, any of which could be a threat to health if not dealt with
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Hardware shops near me have signs up reminding customers not to touch products unless they are intending to purchase them. In the paint sections where they have the colour cards only one person is allowed in and must sanitize hands in front of the staff. any cards they touch but don't take with them must be binned. A member of staff supervises.

Oddly, the hardware shop seems a much more controlled environment than the supermarket.
 
The only people now allowed in hardware outlets in Melbourne are any tradesmen who are still permitted to work because they work in the fresh air or alone. (Electricians and plasteres, for example, cannot work at the same time.). No construction work on buildings more than 3 floors high is permitted.

Almost all manufacturing and industry has been closed down. All retail except food related shops, petrol stations, banks, pharmacies and post offices are closed.

Any retailers that are able to provide contactless collection or delivery are permitted to do so.

Any food shop that can deliver is allowed to do so. I don't think there's any greater risk from these places than from the many logistics warehouses or from distribution centres for supermarkets, etc. Abattoirs have to reduce their staff by 1/3 so they are not close together and all workers have to wear full PPE clothing.

With public transport greatly reduced and just a few services at night, police will be freed up to do covid-related work.

We can't travel any further than a 5 km radius from home. Only two people can be together outside home, no exercise except walking or jogging for no more than one hour. Only one person can shop for food. And so on. Masks have been compulsory for weeks already.

The purpose of this even more restricted situation is to reduce contact between people as much as possible. The state of emergency restrictions (we now have a state of disaster) have prevented a trending increase in numbers. There was one scary day with over 700 cases but they have been bouncing around a lot. The R number has been around one but the aim is to eliminate it instead of allowing it to grumble along for who knows how long with constant restrictions.
 
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