Australia has only one mask factory, and the Army was only sent in yesterday to start helping to ramp up production?
Six weeks after this disaster was obvious to bloggers-watching-twitter-feeds, the entirely predictable shortage of masks is only just starting to be addressed? Why weren’t they doing this a month ago?
Australian Defence Force soldiers have been deployed to help Australia’s only mask manufacturer, Med-Con, near Shepparton.
The Federal Government confirmed on Tuesday about a dozen ADF personnel would be called out under the Defence Assistance to the Civil Community rules to help Med-Con ramp up production of personal protective equipment.
Three army trucks were seen heading north on Old Dookie Rd about 7.20 am Wednesday morning.
Australians are panic buying because the sheer incompetence of our medical advice and management is obvious to everyone. It didn’t occur to me to suggest the government get local mask production running because any sensible ten year old would have seen that coming.
The Greg Hunt mantra on Jan 31: WHO declares emergency. “We are prepared.”
March 5th: Dental practices face closure because of shortage of surgical masks.
March 18th: doctors are warning a promised influx of almost 100,000 COVID-19 test kits in the coming week, won’t be enough.
Incompetence.
Lesson No.2
Don’t stand near Greg Hunt. Disaster may deflect onto you.
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I haven’t heard anything about Murphy before this clusterf**ck ,but minister Hunt has a record of incompetence in any portfolio he has had responsibility for. Much to say about nothing.
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I guess the end result is your monument….choose wisely what will be written upon it….
“What we do in life, echoes in eternity”
– Maximus
“Gladiator”
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Is the mask factory government owned?
If not then why are we blaming the government for (what seems to be) a lack of foresight by factory management?
I would also like to know the led time on their materials. Like the saying goes, you can’t make an omelette without actually owning eggs and if you can’t buy new eggs straight away you just have to go with omelettes for a while.
(Then again, I am egg ill-tolerant, so I maybe I am bias against egg users… 😀 )
My semi educated guess is the factory have been waiting to ramp up, but needed to wait for new materials to arrive. The army personal seem to be from logistics branches, so are there to help with peak forklift workload that has suddenly become a problem with their goods inwards.
Guess. Open to discussion.
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It was an epidemic 6 weeks ago “Officially”.
(Even though we here could see the bigger train wreck coming then )
So officially Hunt & Murphy knew it was an epidemic
But did nothing to increase supply of face masks !
Not a whisper in the manufacturer’s ear ?
Not an email via the ether ?
Not even an old fashioned phone call ..
Of course the private company could have made the call
& boosted supply 6 weeks ago
And charged a high price for taking the risk involved
But of course it would then have copped flack for doing so.
Ummmmm ?
So much better to simply put competent people
In charge at the ministry for Health
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Yes, as a former MD of a manufacturing industry company I would be demanding to know why our sales and marketing people had not requested increased production and warehouse stock under the circumstances prevailing.
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Wouldnt an MD who hadnt bought everyone together to map out a plan in the face of a global pandemic be see to be asleep at the wheel? rather than pointing fingers down the food chain?
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It’s not just face masks
What about hand sanitisers & alcohol wipes for cleaning down surfaces ?
They too are virtually unavailable in Australia now.
That too speaks of dumb incompetence !
PS : We were looking ahead & bought a supply of all these items in mid February.
If I could read the warning signs in the media and here on Jo’s blog
Why couldn’t these two idiots ?
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Probably because most of australia is scientifically illiterate?
Hey..the bulk of the population believes in climate change fairies….
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a whole lot of armchair hindsight generalling going on
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If it is this badly managed under Lib+Nats, can you imagine had much more badly managed it would have been under Lab+Grn !!!!!
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Well we vote the Lib & Nats back
on the assumption that they were competent.
But maybe that really only meant “more competent “.
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Why hadn’t the factory already ramped up production?
Were their supply lines disrupted by Covid 19 in China?
The army are not factory ‘specialists’ – how will they help, by pointing a gun?
When governments seize the means of production socialism is the result.
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the military have most of the skills (especially the useful ones) that the rest of the community have. They are generally better trained and more disciplined.
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Interestingly Britain is going to rent private hospital facilities, while Spain nationalised theirs. Guess which is cheaper on the federal budget.
In France – Louis Vuitton has turned some of their production into face masks, we have some capacity in clothing manufacture here as well, and it should be utilised. Mind you it is not much, but there is some. ADA for example manufactures uniforms for the armed forces (around 500,000/year) and for NSW health around 30,000 a year
Again, we are going to need to go back to what was considered necessary in the Great Depression, and during World War 2.
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Social distancing works. Assume that 500 identified infections is actually 30,000 hiddden infections. That seems like a big number but represents maybe 1,500 hospitalizations. Its manageble
https://www.cbc.ca/news/health/corona-virus-covid-19-1.5499872
Once social distancing is in place transmission is greatly reduced. Testing testing and isolation keeps transmissions loe. The key is to massively test and get ahead of the hidden infections. When those are quickly isolated, the social distancing can be relaxed
The streets of Toronto are empty. Social distancing works. Now to test and isolate
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Message sent:
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Sadly this sums up our polity. Gross mismanagement and ineptitude. I reckon Donald Horne had it just right. Such a pity and a crying shame.
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The government are choosing the economy over people .. Money corporations & big business first deliberately. The people should follow the stay the f**k home movement. The government is as always throwing the sheep under the bus to become ill and die. In 14 days the virus will be at 1,000,000 in 1 month it will be 10 million. The only way to stop this is quarantine along with other measures like Singapore and South Korea closing our boarders and airports.. our Govt knows what’s going on they just don’t care … the people have the power to stay home and be safe if no one is out and about the virus would die off. I sincerely hope the Australian people use their power and choose themselves over the greedy politicians and central banks motivations. Uk and is are doing same thing. Why is it that every other country including France that are putting their citizens first have tests yet us Australia and Uk don’t ??
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Makes you wonder why not everyone on the Diamond Princess cruise ship got infected in a closed environment.
I think people have dialled down by themselves, even out here in regional land I have noticed a general downturn in traffic and activity. Maybe just an artifact of everything being cancelled I guess. Not a great time to be in hospitality.
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83% did NOT get infected and 8% did not have symptoms. That under the worst possible conditions for the spread of the virus.
CORRECTION: They didn’t have Greg Hunt in charge so things could have been worse.
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As I sit here watching my retirement money fade away, watch food and essentials get scarce, ponder that my favorite places to consult like minds; pubs, restaurants, barber shops and churches are shuttered. Begin to realize that a decent militia would HAVE to be more than 10 people and now banned from gathering……..
I’m beginning to have a growing uneasy feeling.
A feeling something like I imagine a mouse feels when it rambles into that mechanical tunnel. You know, the one that smells of cheese…….
Could the bastards I’ve hated all my life be smart enough? Bold enough?
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Whatever stocks of masks existed were sent to bushfire areas in January. It takes a while to rebuild stocks. My town alone probably has enough masks to supply the entire nation for a day or two.
Besides, we’ve been continually told that masks make no difference.
Stick to your knitting.
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Heeeey, don’t criticise the tardiness of our medical leaders, they have REALLY IMPORTANT things to worry about, like global warming. 😉
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The thing that really strikes you is the way that people are prepared to cooperate in the bad sense of accepting poor advice. I keep reading heads of the various Medical Associations telling us that, irrespective of whether an utterance is true or safe, it should be accepted because it comes from a recognised authority.
This is called ‘authoritarianism’, and it can be seen in every crisis our species has faced, leading to the worst decisions. For example: jumping over the wall at Gallipoli, killing hundreds of thousands in Iraq because of non-existent weapons of mass destruction, putting a nuclear reactor on a beach at Fukushima, and keeping the schools open to kill grandparents in the time of Covid-19.
All of these decisions and policies were recommended by expert politician-bureaucrats, and the bastions of society flocked to cheer them on and censor anyone who dared to disagree or put a sane perspective about.
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