JoNova
A science presenter, writer, speaker & former TV host; author of The Skeptic's Handbook (over 200,000 copies distributed & available in 15 languages).
Jo appreciates your support to help her keep doing what she does. This blog is funded by donations. Thanks!
Follow Jo's Tweets To report "lost" comments or defamatory and offensive remarks, email the moderators at: support.jonova AT proton.me
Statistics
Interesting change happened to the Queensland Health “Current status and contact tracing alerts — coronavirus (COVID-19)” page sometime during the last 48 hours.
A bit over a day ago they used to say there had been 57795 “Samples tested”, but today the column header is “People tested” and the number has gone up by +901.
The federal DoH infographic for Friday also shows Qld having done 58490 tests, not people, at a 1.6% positive test rate. That implies 935 confirmed cases for Qld which is almost identical to what Qld had as confirmed cases on their own page on Sunday.
Is the new figure really the number of samples, or was the old figure always the number of people, or is the new figure actually plausible as a number of people?
There are undoubtedly hundreds of people who have been tested more than once (different samples) because the protocol for declaring a case “recovered” requires two consecutive samples with negative tests. The number of samples tested must necessarily be more than triple the number of recovered cases, and the People total certainly cannot be more than the number of Samples (unless they are sampling pets too??).
More formally, at minimum:
Samples(t) >= People(t) + 2 * Recovered(t)That’s not even counting retests of essential workers and ongoing severe cases, so this formula is an underestimate of how many more samples there should be than unique people.
I cannot find recoveries data for Qld specifically, but the upper limit for recoveries is the number of positive tests, and we know the cumulative positive test percentage at that point was 1.57%. So…
People(t) <= Samples(t) - NegativeRetests(t) - 2 * Recovered(t)People(t) <= Samples(t) - 0?? - 2 * (PositiveRate(t) * Samples(t))
People(t) <= 57795 - 0?? - 2 * (1.57% * 57795)
People(t) <= 57795 - 0?? - 1814
People(t) <= 55980 - 0??
So under these (IMHO logical) constraints the cumulative number of people tested was less than 55980 on Sunday and it has gone up by 2715 in two days, which is only 1350 tests per day and they’ve managed up to 1800 tests in a day at least once before. So this new figure for People actually seems plausible.
Then the question is… how many of these tested people are Qld Health staff? For comparison, the total number of Hospital and Health Services staff (excluding State department administrators) is 72000 and the Metro North HHS has 8000 just by itself.
Assuming these new reported figures are true, I’ll admit I was mistaken about how many unique people have been tested, it is way bigger than I thought. Although this new number is encouraging it is still not quite the cross-sectional breakdown of society that I was wishing for last week.
More good news is that Qld’s test criteria seems to have been expanded to allow anyone in the Metro Area who is showing symptoms to get tested. Of course that will ruin all the predictions I made 2 days ago because now wider testing eligibility may lead to an escalation in positives. But this is still good. My main complaint about the testing is now eliminated. They are now ready to leap off the International Island and discover the Covid Continent amongst the great unwashed.
90
If you analyse all the states data, you will find a significant reduction in the daily testing since the end of March.
This despite all the health authority spokesmen saying they are increasing the rate and scope of testing. I suspect some of this data is loose estimates.
50
They may have improved the throughput at labs but the testing criteria for who gets tested within QLD has barely changed in 2 weeks. I doubt it’s changed much in other states either though NSW might have stepped up its random tests (didn’t check).
Current Queensland test criteria:
However any wider testing would only tell us what we already know, that we do have community spreading right across Australia, else there would not be the constant dribble of ~100 cases to the hospitals each day.
So its time to make sure the isolation is more strict and works during the next 2 to 3 weeks, because we have no hope of detecting and isolating it via testing to eliminate it, so that is our only option to head off and quash a second peak from forming.
60
No, i was not refering to the work rate in the labs, but the actual number of tests done on the population.
If you listen to the public information anouncements, or the updates from the state authorities, most of them have said they are increasing the amount of testing generally to investigate various “hot spots” and to find the extent of “ community transfer” .
… however those statements do not allign with the actual reported level of daily testing which seems to bee dropping ?
PS… those 100 daily cases are not all going to hospital, they are just “new cases” , most of which will just be confined to isolation at home.
30
Once the random tests are conducted, speculating about linear or exponential etc will be a thing of the past. It will even be possible to know the percentage of a population that have antibodies, etc, etc..
For example…
From: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-04-03/random-coronavirus-testing-begins-in-canberra/12119364
‘Random’ coronavirus testing to begin in Canberra next week at drive-through centre and clinic
Updated April 03, 2020 17:37:08
01
From: The Lancet
https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(20)30788-1/fulltext
“Developing antibody tests for SARS-CoV-2”
Anna Petherick
Published:April 04, 2020
Antibodies reveal evidence of a previous infection any time from about a week after the infection occurred. “At the moment we are only estimating the number of people who have been infected. No one in the world has measured that properly yet”, says Martin Hibberd, professor of emerging infectious diseases at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, UK. “We think that children are infective but asymptomatic, for example, but we don’t know enough about this—and that information matters for decisions about whether to close schools.”
00
Bloody hell. Qld Health just changed their stats page again and the heading on that column has switched from “People tested” back to being labelled “Samples tested”! :-S
So the title change to “People” was a mistake! While the math did show it was plausible as an upper limit, ie not impossible based on past test throughput, it was always predicated on the reported figure being a true count of unique people. Now we see it wasn’t. So we’re back to not knowing how may people have been tested.
Did somebody let the work experience kid update the pandemic status page or what?
00
What about Modelling?
Australian Government Modelling of the Coronavirus Outbreak seems to be about as far OFF target as could be imagined.
How can they make any rational decisions if they rely on Modelling instead of actual data?
140
Apparently this is the modelling!
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-04-07/custom-image-of-coronavirus-flattening-curve-modelling-graph/12129854
The current curve is Nothing Like the Modelling!
Time for the experts to take another look at the figures, and for Scott Morrison to ask some awkward questions from his expert panel.
Can we start think about how we get back to work?
150
But Peter, you know the algorithm:
Data + Computer = Fantasy
If Fantasy = Phenomenal, then Result.
Run around in circles and claim model’s beatitude.
120
PeterC, please get real. When can we start thinking about getting back work?
The answer is not soon. Look at the European countries, do you want us to follow down the path of Spain or Italy? If the government takes it’s foot off the brake thats where we’re heading!
GeoffW
22
Geoffrey,
It plainly obvious we are on a completely different “ path” to Spain, Italy or GB, etc. and the likely hood of us going down that route is remote , to say the least..
There is something very different about the way the virus is behaving in Au compared to most other countries, ..and its not the haphazard way we have managed quarantine etc .
00
Have just made some initial comments about the modelling in a previous thread. Look at where they have derived most of their assumption from.
40
Interesting to note that the US modelling, from late January to now, has dropped its death predications by 94%. In late Jan, the modelling predicted 1-2 million deaths. As of yesterday, the same modelling now predicts 82,000 deaths.
50
At the beginning of the outbreak, you have no actual data. If you have to rely on actual data, you have to buy them from clairvoyants. I prefer modelling. Do I like it? No. Could you recommend another approach?
20
Just ask the WHO and Bill Gates what it’s all about and what we need to do, and don’t question anything.
91
Has anyone else seen this ‘funny’ video clip ?
https://www.facebook.com/groups/526214578118443/
22
That’d be the Capitalists doing the unacceptable then?
10
When you have only 100 new cases a day and rapidly dropping, who needs modelling? The enemy is a self replicating chemical which cannot exist without people and then only for a few weeks.
Computers are no smarter than the people who write the software, which we have learned from man made Global Warming. Not a single prediction in thousands has been true in over 30 years.
Isolation is not only smart, it is a death sentence for the virus for which replication is its only function. (Yes, I know. If it’s not alive, it cannot die. Pardon my anthropomorphism. It’s part of fear. )
As it was for Smallpox. And the Black Death. The difference here is have we have a great chance of saving the living, given that the epidemic did not eventuate. And we can stop it happening again, both by innoculation
and tight screening at the airport. Or checking of the innoculations of incoming passengers, which used to be standard practice in travel. Airports care more about apples and grapes these days than people.
Of course there will always be those who say it is just another flu, overrated, we over reacted. We should have done nothing. So I am absolutely delighted that all governments acted in concert with all available resources to stop this thing. Apart from the Ruby Princess, which was criminal neglect and cost many lives and could have devastated the entire country.
And I will look forward to the books on how this was done, how the virus trackers worked, what were the puzzles. Hopefully a history book on the Epidemic that nearly was. That champagne is cooling. Zero new cases.
It will be of great concern also to find out how they treat Boris Johnson. They would have the option of antibodies stripped from donor plasma, taking about six donors to supply enough. That is guaranteed to work quickly and more than appropriate for a Prime Minister of any age.
This particular weapon of war, this man made disaster may well have been expected to strip heads of state. But more likely its escape was an accident, like Chernobyl.
160
Indeed it will.
I hope they give the HCQ/Zn/Azithromycin triple treatment a shot.
Although, it should have been done early last week.
May God bless Boris.
80
Hey…Western Australia turning back into a penal colony again…..an electronic ball and chain…..
How does that song go again ? “6 months in a leaky boat…”
Contrast to Sweden where people are treated as grown ups……hmmm…..
Bad human…sit…beg…roll over….noo…..bad huamn…. *sigh*
https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/coronavirus/coronavirus-australia-live-news-healthcare-workers-to-receive-11-million-masks-wa-to-use-ankle-bracelets-to-monitor-quarantine-dodgers/ar-BB12hMn4?li=AAgfYrC
“Western Australia has bought 200 ankle bracelets to enforce quarantine requirements
“WA Premier Mark McGowan says the government is buying 200 ankle bracelets with GPS tracking capability, to fit to people who don’t comply with quarantine requirements.
“”A non-compliant quarantine or self isolating person will have one of these devices fitted to monitor and restrict movements as part of our efforts to protect the community. We hope we don’t need to use many of these devices however I don’t want to take any chances.”
11
Sweden is a new New York. They will have an issue at hand in a few week.
Sweden is worse than the US average, and really scary in terms of dead/capita.
20
But wait…it gets better…police trawling caravan parks with ANPR looking for people from interstate?
Citizen…your papers please! I’m sorry…but this is using Cov19 as excuse to push out the Police State apparatus.
Police State or Banana republic? Maybe both. Great money maker too no doubt….
https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/number-plate-recognition-and-cameras-to-identify-those-who-shouldn-t-be-out-over-easter-20200408-p54i5m.html
“NSW Police will use number plate recognition technology and cameras to ensure people adhere to social distancing measures over the Easter long weekend.
“NSW Police Commissioner Mick Fuller said while it might be disappointing for people to stay at home, police will be out patrolling highways, country roads and caravan parks in an effort to slow the spread of coronavirus.
“We will be going through caravan parks early, issuing warnings to people that may think they can get around these laws,” Commissioner Fuller said on Wednesday.
“”People will be given one opportunity to pack up, go back to your home state and go back home. Otherwise, we will, unfortunately, have to issue tickets.”
30
OK. One should look at reality>
Australian Government Modelling seems to be based on very Out of Date Ideas .
It still needs some explanation about why our cases fall so far short of the overseas experience. However even New York seems to be turning their disease rates around, once they started to adopt Quarantine!
40
A lot of the curves are rolling over. Even America is starting to roll over. Strangely France, UK, Germany are all still on the very upward path.
In Australia there is a report in the AUstralian of fourteen cases in Burnie, Tasmania, one patient and ten or so staff at the hospital. And one more in the South, a returned traveller. An ‘outbreak management team’ is onto it.
It explains the blip, I assume. There are still people with coronavirus moving around!
It is absolutely critical that everyone stay where they are. And the people who believe nothing are on television telling us the children have to get back to school. They want to turn victory into defeat. Words are not strong enough.
91
tdef
here are the stats for the UK up to April 2nd.
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/877621/Weekly_all_cause_mortality_surveillance_week_14_2020_report.pdf
Expected deaths are lower this year than in 2017 and 2014. It is a combination of winter warmth (less deaths due to cold houses) this winter season and a light flu season which is by far the biggest killer and in bad years kills some 48000 brits. Don’t forget we have some 600,000 deaths a year.
50
It would all be trivial if the Wuhan Virus ran rampant. Mulitiply those figures by ten. Everyone now agrees deaths would be in the millions within two months. And when we succeed and eliminate the Wuhan virus from our island, people will say it is not as bad as last year’s flu season. At what cost?
This virus has to be wiped out, can be wiped out, like smallpox, the Black Death. Boris Johnson’s dithering has cost everyone. There is no middle of the road response. This is a weapon of war unleashed on the world, man made or not and from WUhan, like all the other bat viruses. Its lack of symptoms for the first week makes it the fastest moving virus in history, 20x more infective than most corona viruses and able to even jump species.
And then we use our technology to detect and prohibit all those other killer viruses and plagues. Yes, deadly flu has crept up on the fast moving holiday world to be a tolerated pandemic. And these are corona viruses too. It is time we took viruses seriously and fought back. Britain was regularly devasted by the Black death and lost so many people the population was static for hundreds of years. Villages just vanished. The tragedy was beyond comprehension. Every inch of churchyards in London were filled with bodies stacked in pits. There was no time for funerals. Bring out your dead.
Never again. We finally have the will and the technology and it’s time to fight back. Besides, we have no choice. Half measures are nothing.
91
And even if you recover from this virus, at what cost? I suspect the lung, kidney, bowel and health damage is immense and possibly permanent. No one is talking about this yet because it is a life and death choice, but this virus is not to be tolerated. As in WWII, there is no point of compromise but the dithering under Chamberlain did not buy time, it allowed the enemy to grow stronger. And your figures are right, it is amazing what people have come to accept as tolerable. No longer.
70
If its a deliberate act, it is technically an act of war. Ponder that….
60
It has never been deliberate, we’ll have to kill the bats and be free of future pandemics, so we won’t be going to war with our biggest trading partner if they clean up their act.
The authorities are going to ease restrictions in Australia after Easter, we could take a leaf out of the Beijing songbook.
‘Nearly all people who leave Wuhan to other cities will face 14 days quarantine upon arrival and only those with a “green” health rating on government apps will be permitted to leave.
‘Those with ‘red’ or ‘orange’ ratings representing their level of coronavirus risk face further weeks or possibly months of restrictions.’ ABC
24
Ineffective and very late lax isolation with lots of rebellious twits without a cause I suspect. Those should begin to top this week.
20
Peter
I saw the interview where that modelling was introduced. It is nothing more than naval gazing aiming to show the public what has been on display at this site since early February. It is intended to support the basis of the lockdown and show how Australia can flatten the curve. So far Australia is ahead of the best scenario in that paper.
The Covid19healthdata site still does not bother showing the trajectory for Australia:
https://covid19.healthdata.org/sweden
It now has most of Europe as well as USA and States. Sweden is heading for over 4000 deaths according to this projection. US still in th 80k plus range.
Australia does now make it onto the NYTimes chart:
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/03/21/upshot/coronavirus-deaths-by-country.html
The latest there has 42 deaths and doubling every 5 days. I think the exponential rise is actually less than doubling every 5 days but we will see. Who knows what is happening on the Ruby Princess with its crew.
10
They’ll go well under that if they keep reducing the daily new cases as a percentage of active cases.
20
It will come as no surprise to most readers of this site that the majority of WOKE people are employed on the government payroll. They have been largely insulated from economic problems, as they have secured over the last 40 odd years secure employment, annual pay rises and generous retirement benefits, voted for by politicians anxious for their votes. Lack of achievement has been rewarded by more money and more employees, especially in the ‘management’ section. Once the COVID19 emergency is over they will think that these will continue, but will it?
The government’s choices of dealing with the resulting debt & depression.
Continue throwing money away, ‘kicking the can’ which will lead to runaway inflation and collapse.
Raise taxes which will lead to a very annoyed lot of voters, & stagnation.
Reduce expenditure, where?
Consider Health:
Here we have an area burdened with enormous numbers of bureaucrats. Years ago a doctor friend told me that the matron they hired for a private hospital made it a condition that the nurses didn’t count bed linen, pans etc. In the public hospital she left, on every shift at least 2, and as many as 6, out of 120 max. nurses would be so employed to satisfy the Accounting Dept., who were dismissive of the figures given by Nursing Aids.
Nurses are valuable, more than shiny bums, except the latter don’t think so.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eyf97LAjjcY
Consider Education.
This can be divided into 4 areas.
a) Primary school where children are (supposedly) taught to read and write, with combined childcare.
b) Secondary school where the emphasis shifts to specialised subjects with some idea of keeping students off the streets.
c) Tertiary supposedly providing a foundation of knowledge for future employment.
d) A grossly inflated bureaucracy ‘controlling’ this sector.
Starting at the last (d); Education is supposedly a State responsibility. While the Federal government wants to stop some States behaving poorly the funding could be controlled by setting simple targets. There is no need for a mass of bureaucrats generating memos. If literacy standards fall (as an example) below those of Uzbekistan, then less not more money should be supplied. If the State wishes to employ a quota of handicapped gay vegan Llamas then it is up to that State to find the funds (and face the voters).
(c) The cost of Universities is inflated with “Managers” exceeding the teaching staff in numbers. Reducing the number of committee meetings alone would free up lecturers time to do that research they always claim they want to do.
(b) The forced isolation has shown that the old idea of a teacher with a limited class is unnecessary. Recorded lessons can be delivered via the internet, whether at home (even in remote areas) or in modified school buildings. The best teachers can be used to put together standard lectures, possibly several versions of the same subject, which could be used for years. Available to all students interested, even for those bright ones keen to go ahead or for revision. On-line tutorials should be an option, along with mini-exams to monitor progress. In any case there will be a lesser number of teachers, and a considerably lower number of bureaucrats.
I put this idea up for discussion.
140
The road never ends for a sovereign government creating its own money.
I suspect that after the CV19 lockdown there will be many factors that are deflationary. Those people caught out this time will be wanting to build a buffer. Those retired Australians spending their kids inheritance will not be as keen to do the overseas trip or luxury cruise. Oil will be in the doldrums for a while. Wholesale electricity price and gases prices will be lower in Australia until businesses get up and running again. These factors offset the inflationary pressure from farms and rural communities rebuilding after drought and fires. I can see pressure on food prices right now but 2020 is shaping up as a good growing season.
The risk is external balances. That was in good shape at the end of 2019 with net international position improving by 10% in the last quarter. That is a big gain for a quarter. I remain surprised that the iron ore price is still over USD80/t. I thought it would crash but China must still be producing steel. Taiwan is a big steel producer as is Japan and they have not shut up shop.
The sovereign debt really does not matter unless the public spending drives inflation. Right now the public spending is just keeping food on tables for people who are not earning. That is not particularly inflationary in the context of Australia because the country produces ample food for internal consumption most of the time. The public funds keep the economy in a holding pattern. The RBA could take interest rates negative making the sovereign debt a money spinner for government. At some point, negative interest rate will hit on bank deposits and then people look for a place to stuff cash; very risky for people to have their savings literally in their mattress.
20
Stop spending money on stupid pet greenie proposals and stop spending money on AIMs and NGOs heroically ‘saving’ the Great Barrier Reef with other people’s hard earned totally wasted money.
60
Climate change article on the ABC News website today about hydroxyl radicals has this lovely sentence.
“Carbon dioxide, the main greenhouse gas, is mostly removed from the atmosphere by plants and absorption into the ocean, but it’s a slow process.”
Really? The main greenhouse gas,CO2, what water vapour, a gas is not responsible for keeping the Earth warm and truly is the main greenhouse gas or so I’ve been reliability informed.
90
Firstly, CO2 is constant, but your day is affected in every way by clouds, water, rain, humidity. And given the extremes in some desert climates (Colorado, Russia) of -40C to +40C during a single year, I fail to see how
CO2 moderates that. It clearly does not stop -40C, so what good is it?
There is also obviously input from the plants. Consider that CO2 is going up and total plant coverage is increasing in direct proportion, as agreed by the CSIRO. Now if the plants actually ingested all that CO2, why hasn’t it gone down? Because the reservoir of CO2 is in the vast ocean as is well known. And total plant life is negligible by comparison. All that business about the biosphere is rubbish, the Bern diagram.
A slightly warmer sun, fewer clouds means more CO2 from slightly warmer ocean surface. Simple ancient physical chemistry. And with more CO2 more plants grow. Our industrial use of CO2 has no effect on total CO2. Nor the installation of half a million large windmills at a cost of trillions. Nor all the coal power stations in China.
We cannot change CO2. It is in equilibrium and we are of no consequence. But we put a man on the moon? Yes, fifty years ago. And we can climb Mt. Everest. Neither makes us masters of this world and a little piece of RNA can eliminate us.
120
You see the CO2 pushers insist the planet would be freezing without ‘greenhouse gas’ CO2. The fact that it is -40C in winter across much of the world means that is obviously rubbish. You do not need to be qualified in dead wombats like Professor Flannery to work that one out.
And a cloudy night is far hotter anywhere than a freezing clear sky where the temperature plummets the moment the sun goes down. Water vapour is a greenhouse gas and you do not need a scientist to analyse that either. It obviously traps the heat where CO2 lets it all go.
Everything about man made Global Warming is wrong.
Like the Pell case. Nothing made any sense. How can a man be convicted of assaulting someone when that person said it didn’t happen and never made a complaint? Either the victim and his assailant are both ly*ng or the third person is. Don’t ask me why someone would do such a thing, but even the police were trolling for complaints against Pell. It tells you the whole thing was f*ke. And the unjustified second trial was a shambles and media circus.
However the dead man’s father is angry and wants ‘justice’ and cash compensation for his loss. Nothing more needs to be said.
110
Yes, water vapor is by far the dominant GHG. Also, about 25% of the atmospheric CO2 is replaced every year in the natural flux, so it is a very fast process. They are either very ignorant or lying.
70
The concept in chemistry not known to most non scientists is equilibrium. CO2 existed before the industrial revolution, but what set the level? Is CO2 a product of biology or is biology a result of CO2? Carbon is one of the most common elements in the universe, not a pollutant. Almost all life we know is carbon based, carbon dioxide based. Vast quantities of highly soluble, highly compressible CO2 are stored in the oceans, far more than the other essential gas oxygen. And what comes out into the thin atmosphere is determined entirely by sea surface temperature and Henry’s law.
The modern human centric view of the planet though is that we humans control everything. If CO2 goes up, we must have done it. Our mighty engines are polluting the planet with CO2. And our CO2 is changing CO2 levels and that in turn is heating the planet and changing climates.
Yes, the CO2 is rapidly exchanging with the oceans, as shown by C14 levels. The world average is 7 years for half the CO2 to vanish and the CO2 of the time of WWII is all gone, reduced by 1000. And very slight warming of the planet increases CO2 dramatically as it is at a record low.
This is the simple science explanation. Then you have Greta. And college footballer Al gore. And would be scientist Tim Flannery. And millions of people riding on the back of the man made fantasy.
A real pandemic is destroying their world ending logic. Man made Climate Change is not even detectable.
130
It would be more accurate to state “unreliably informed”
The “greenhouse gas” theory is easily proven false using satellite data:
https://1drv.ms/b/s!Aq1iAj8Yo7jNg1uzA-KKFEvD5BzX
Outgoing radiation and atmospheric water vapour are highly POSITIVELY correlated. As water vapour goes up so does OLR. As water vapour goes down so does OLR. This is dead opposite to “greenhouse gas” theory.
30
That is the diametric opposite of what I see when I superimpose relative humidity over OLR.
50
Correlation is not causation. Your devil’s advocate said the system is not cooling because it is wet but it is warm, and is cooling via both radiative and evaporative methods.
10
Watching Bolt on the Bolt Report, has just [savaged] the ABC on Pell….amazing to watch…apparently called them the “Witchhunter General”….
[Edited upon request of Steve – J]
130
Yes I saw it too. Bolt got stuck right into the ABC and named a lot of people. I wish someone in government did the same. That’s the least they could do. Of course the best they could do is stop funding the ABC with OUR money until they are dragged out of the cessp00l and cleaned up.
160
In Parliament today, Albo asked the government ‘ to restore ABC funding because it is the people’s main source of information for COVID-19’ (paraphrase)
Morrison: ‘Yes, the ABC is doing a great job and it has to learn to live within its allocated funding like the rest of the nation!’ Touche!
40
The ABC and the Victorian judicial system have been exposed to all in relation the Pell to be a total disgrace. Both need to be investigated and overhauled for that reason alone.
20
It is becoming ever more noticeable as this pandemic progresses, the extent to which people are relying not upon themselves but government and health professionals for answers. The bottom up approach seems to be sadly lacking at the individual and governmental level. We are instead largely accepting of a sluggish, reactionary top down approach. Those in this blog are mostly exceptions to this learned helplessness.
It is disturbing to see ongoing propaganda on the efficacy of masks emanating from first world governments. On the flipside, it’s also disappointing to be criticised for pointing out to those who say at this later stage of the pandemic they can’t obtain masks, they could make their own with little effort. It’s as though their life didn’t depend on it!
We should all be questioning why many of the governments of the world, who are struggling with the best allocation of limited resources, are not devolving power to their own citizens to test themselves and to wear masks. They should at the very least plan to do so when the equipment becomes available. Why is it that some countries have allowed doctors to determine who should end up in hospital and others have simply crowded every sick person into a hospital? Can there be any doubt these centralised processes are exacerbating the spread of this virus?
With the Japanese theory of micro-droplets posted last week, we received perhaps the most plausible explanation yet of how this virus is spreading. It provides us with the research to develop a personal risk framework that can carry through the end of this lockdown. There’s been precious little response to the research in the form of re-orientation of the public health advisories. Are we dealing with a medical establishment that is applying peacetime risk assessments in a time of crisis?
I’d like to put to this online community an idea on the assessment criteria for measuring risk of micro-droplet transmission. This is entirely exclusive of the continuing need to wash hands very regularly. The criteria might be;
V – Ventilation – How well ventilated is the area?
D – Duration – What is the duration of contact? Is it for more than 20-30 minutes?
D – Density – How many persons are in the subject enclosed/unenclosed area?
P – Proximity – How close are persons to each other? Are they clustered or evenly distributed?
A – Activity – Are the area occupants talking/singing, coughing, sneezing?
M – Masks – How many persons in area are wearing masks?
If these criteria are recognised as risk factors and public health policy seeks to mitigate same, I believe a pathway to lifting lockdowns quickly becomes achievable. In the meantime assessing personal circumstances using this checklist is empowering and a good base from which to start to demand a return of your freedoms.
62
The only bottom up approach that will work is when voters in general wake up and stop voting for the same old two parties over and over, and expecting a different result. What’s the definition of insanity again?
20
Further evidence now emerging on micro-droplet / Aerosolization theory via Dr. John Campbell’s Youtube channel. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ycf6bAMKgjg
10
Beyond belief! In the Australian, next to a picture of Prime Minister Boris Johnson fighting for his life, “Plan to let virus infect us slowly”
A long-term strategy to ease social-isolation restrictions and expose Australians to COVID-19 (Formerly the Wuhan virus but you don’t want to offend the Chinese Government or suggest they are responsible) in ‘manageable doses’ without
overwhelming the public health system, is being considered by the country’s chief health officials and some NSW government ministers”
Are these the same geniuses who let the Ruby Princess disembark with no controls? Don’t they learn anything? What is it about NSW that it accounts for half the cases and half the deaths and some people think that is
better than being stopped enjoying the beach? Can’t they wait a few weeks?
We have nearly won, and they wants to stop winning. The same thing in WWII when the churches in England wanted the Allies to be compassionate to the Germans and go easy when the war was nearly over.
They are probably the same lot (including Malcolm Turnbull’s great uncle) who thought England should have surrendered in the first place!
We are within a breath of wiping this monster out and someone wants it kill more people people more slowly so we can cope better? To what point? When will we say, no more killer viruses in this country. Keep them overseas. We don’t want them.
And we do not want measles and whooping cough and tuberculosis and Hendra and MERS and SARS and ebola and the other corona viruses and flus which kill thousands every year. Test at the airport and test at the cruise terminals
as we used to do. We lock up animals to prevent infection, but not people. And children can catch anything they want and bring it to school.
There is always someone whose personal ‘liberty’ is threatened, someone who resents having to drive on only one side of the road or obey traffic lights. Someone who cannot stand being inconvenienced, say NSW Government Ministers.
And there are some incredibly fatalistic doctors who believe nothing can be stopped anyway, so you might as well give in. This is presented as profound wisdom. Perhaps they need to go back to medical school and learn what can be done
today. We test and quarantine and check at every point of entry with grapes, grain, wood, apples, fruit, dogs, cats, horses but for some reason, deadly infections in humans are to be given free rein.
And we have seen what Senior NSW Government ministers can do. Please, not again!
131
Meanwhile the death toll in the UK is climbing faster than Italy. And Italy has overtaken China. And our ‘chief health officials” think this virus is something which should be part of the landscape in Australia.
Perhaps we can bring back the Spanish flu, just for a bit of fun and variety? See how that goes.
There is a sense of unreality in government as senior officials play games with our lives. All for our own good of course, because they know better. Anyone involved in the Ruby Princess disaster should stand down for a start.
And what sort of kick in the guts is it for all those people fighting this virus and to stop its spread to read that some geniuses think it should come back. We should try again, but better prepared perhaps with more coffins.
92
TdeF,
Be careful of statistics. It seems as though many “normal” causes of death are now being labelled “Coronavirus” I all sorts of countries.
The statistics are not matching the sensationalist media descriptions of what is happening.
Look what climate folk do with statistics to “””prove””” their point.
121
Statistics? Sensationalist. The early videos out of Wuhan showed corpses in the streets. They are using cardboard coffins in Italy. Morgues are overflowing and priests are dying. The world is in lockdown. Who needs statistics?
As the world throws everything at stopping this declared pandemic, statistics are irrelevant. This is a fight to the death and the British PM is fighting for his life. This is not the flu.
And when we win, we do not want it back. Or any of the other popular corona viruses which kill millions a year. Those numbers are also monstrous but pale into insignificance. And it is all unnecessary. The humble flu k*lls more people by far than war. And it is stoppable at the airport and terminals, but who cares. The tourist industry is too big.
Climate folk haven’t a leg to stand on. While children protest their extinction rebellion, we have another Black Death on our hands. Except this time we have the technology to fight it. Statistics? We want total victory not an accommodation. Then we want to get rid of all the other viruses from our countries. Boris Johnson does not have the flu. It will take weeks and all of medical science to save his life. And he is only 55. Winston Churchill was 65 at the start of WWII.
83
Rows of trucks outside hospitals for bodies is sensationalism – particularly when they are not required.
02
So you don’t believe it. Even when the trucks are military.
10
I don’t believe it when the trucks are empty.
01
I don’t believe it when the trucks are empty. As are the wards, particularly ICU.
12
And drones to disinfect and impressive robots squirting out misting the streets because there is no UV in China because the pollution blocks out the sun..
We are lucky in Au where we don’t need to spray disinfectant outdoors due to our high UV outside.
10
So now you know why we don’t need to spray disinfectant outdoors in Australia like they do in China.
It’s because there is no UV light from the sun in China due to the sun being blocked by pollution.
So there you have it and there it is 🙂
40
Part of the problem is the sensationalism, and now the ever increasing polarisation (closed mindedness). The proverbial cat is out of the bag and has been for some time.
From: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lGC5sGdz4kg
#FlattentheCurve
Perspectives on the Pandemic | Professor Knut Wittkowski | Episode 2
287,307 views
•Apr 3, 2020
“Perspectives on the Pandemic Episode 2: In this explosive second edition of Perspectives on the Pandemic, Professor Knut Wittkowski, for twenty years head of The Rockefeller “University’s Department of Biostatistics, Epidemiology, and Research Design, says that social distancing and lockdown is the absolutely worst way to deal with an airborne respiratory “virus.
“Further, he offers data to show that China and South Korea had already reached their peak number of cases when they instituted their containment measures. In other words, nature had “already achieved, or nearly achieved, herd immunity.
“Watch episode 1 here: https://youtu.be/d6MZy-2fcBw
“Interview highlights:
00:36-Professor Wittkowski explains his recommendations for how to best deal with COVID-19
01:36-Is self-isolation prolonging the duration of COVID-19?
02:33-Are policies of self-isolation or shelter-in-place a good idea?
03:46-The pandemic is over
04:27-Did China lie about its COVID-19 statistics?
05:03-The truth behind the statistics given by the government of the United States
07:52-Are we even reporting flu deaths anymore?
08:16-Why are hospitals being overwhelmed?
09:16-Shortage of medial supplies
10:19-Has social distancing prevented deaths from COVID-19?
11:55-Staying indoors can make the virus worse
16:02-Why social distancing won’t work for an airborne contagion
17:41-Do we need a vaccine for COVID-19?
18:31-Humans can grow immune to this virus
18:55-The data doesn’t say that COVID-19 is more contagious than the flu
22:43-Changes in reporting COVID-19 cases
25:33-What makes COVID-19 different than the Swine Flu
27:05-What are the possible health risks of sheltering in place?
27:43-The “Second Wave” of COVID-19
30:10-The truth about #FlattentheCurve
31:10-What should we do about sheltering in place?
32:24-Why we need to achieve natural herd immunity
34:17-Should we be testing everyone for COVID-19?
35:35-The real effects of COVID-19
38:53-The percentage of people who won’t have any symptoms
39:34-What should we do about COVID-19 at this point?
40:40-Is this really a pandemic?
40:50-What you should know
“Professor Wittkowski urges that the schools be open now, so that the virus may spread harmlessly among the young, and thus shorten the amount of time the elderly and immune “compromised must be sequestered. Our current course, he warns, will only prolong the crisis and likely guarantee a ?second wave? of infections in the Fall.
31
I keep reading people saying this – and then I look at the mess the overseas health systems are already in as they strain to
fight the results of a ‘just another virus’ that we should let run free and get ‘herd immunity’. I’m amazed that people still
are so sanguine that we should let this bug go free. Do they live in Antarctica or a coma and don’t see the chaos already happening
when just a few people are getting infected, as a result of just a modicum of isolation. Do they think they are impervious to the
virus? Most ones I see on the box look to be at a very succulent age for this virus to cop the full blast of it.
Outcomes are, many recover, with no immediate problems, but I would suggest an unknown extended time off work. Their long term
lung condition is currently unknown. Many die, have severe lung damage, and, having not seen a post mortem report or ten, God only
knows what else. ‘Only the old and infirm die’ was the original yarn and kids no problems. I would swear to seeing reports lately
that show that’s not true, even if the numbers a low. What really would be the case if the disease was allowed free rein?
Shall we give that a go? According to the learned, we would have nothing to lose!
What we are forgetting is the officially stated aim of ‘flattening the curve’ is to make the epidemic manageable for the health system.
It has never officially been to actually eradicate the virus, unless I missed something. We have no drugs and no vaccine to actually
beat the virus. Hence, we are all meant to ‘get’ the disease in the best of British traditions ‘without having or making a fuss’. Just
go quietly through a well run, quiet system without all the noise clamour and catastrophe we currently see outside hospitals.
It would seem therefore that the official idea of ‘herd immunity’ is still the go (the only go?)! That would seem to me to mean
that we older chaps and the ‘prior injured’ are hopefully a little more protected by a larger part of the nation being resistant from
prior infection, carrying antibodies, and by a prolonged demand to self isolate until a drug or vaccine is developed. This, accompanied
by doing the Asian tiger thing of isolating the infected and hunting down and isolating their contacts, is the only way I could see
the economy getting started up quickly enough for the country to survive and avoid shutdown for a year and a depression. I would think
this is the plan. What other choice is there? We have no weapons and the nation must survive on its economy.
Note that the numbers currently (overseas) are infinitessimally small relative to the world population, and herd immunity is implying
a huge number of people to come to get this infection. This is actually the scene to be visited when we try to end the current arrangements.
This is what those saying let it run are not considering. There is no vaccine for this virus like there is for influenza, and God help
any nation that gets both these viruses running together.
Currently, Australia is again looking a bit like a ‘lucky country’, being an island and well away from huge seething populations. To
me, no expert in this matter, our numbers affected look small, relatively. Borders are shut and in WA so are our regions. If only we could
get rid of these damned cruise ships and concentrate on chasing down the infected which should be easier than having 350m people. Do the
TB thing and test test test either everyone or several large cohorts scattered around the nation to picture what problem we have. That’s
also the information we need to get ourselves up an running again in a controlled fashion. Stop p*ddling around and get on with it.
10
And the unanswered question —
What other animals can carry, and be a safe harbor, for this virus?
Bats presumably but what else?
10
TdeF,
The newly constructed Emergency Hospital in New York is empty. Despite this, they are telling the media (loud and strong) that they will need to build another three such hospitals.
20
Tooright, “Exponential growth”. Changes everything in a week.
With viruses, we can’t use “last week” reasoning. Maybe they won’t need them, but horrible if they do and they don’t have them. How effective is NY isolation? How many people are staying home? How much is it spreading in apartments?
50
We have not seen any exponential growth in Australia. Our hospitals are empty and we have more ICU beds available than ever before.
Let’s not forget that the guy running the theatrics in New York is likely to replace Biden as the Dems presidential candidate.
The testing statistics are indicating that the isolation is very effective in Australia. The REAL footage from New York indicates that isolation is being practised very well.
31
“we have not seen any exponential growth in Australia”
What?
https://www.visualcapitalist.com/infection-trajectory-flattening-the-covid19-curve/
We made it to 1,000 in the first ten days from just a handful of cases.
That is how we now have 5,000 people infected and likely 1,000 in hospital and 200 in ICU. Doubling roughly every 3.5 days. x1000 in just a month. The next month would be x1,000,000 but the infections stopped with the lockdown, as you would expect and the number of new cases per day dropped from 450 to now under 100 and falling. That means the infections nearly stopped cold about the time of the lockdown. No surprise there.
Unchecked everyone would have the virus in three months. 2 million in hospital and 500,000 severe cases and 250,000 dead in three months.
Like all doubters, nothing less than the absolutely certain runaway National disaster will suffice as proof. As in Italy and Spain. And thankfully our politicans were convinced by Italy and moved to stop a million infected people and 10,000 dead by now. Of course there are those who do not believe this is possible. It has happened again and again through human history, but thankfully not in the last hundred years. MERS and SARS and Hendra and AIDS and more. All crossover bat viruses. This one however looks like the work of the military Wuhan Institute of Virology.
Either way, it has to be wiped out. And hopefully all the facilities being prepared for total disaster are never needed. Prevention is way better than cure, but it was a near thing in Australia. And now with unbelievable integration of all health services, we have the possibility of stopping all deaths and illness form this virus. It needs to be completely eliminated from this country and barriers put up to prevent reentry. And all its cousins.
50
It’s funny really.
I saw Governor Cuomo, and that was the first thing I thought too.
Hillary must be thanking her lucky stars right now.
Tony.
40
And in case I had not made the point, these lines or curves are plotted on a LOG graph for a reason. The graphs are all exponential but on a log graph that is a straight line. Every straight line is explosive exponential growth.
30
>>”How effective is NY isolation? How many people are staying home?
Or it was hyped by the media that got caught out by people taking matters into their own hands to reveal the truth.
00
TdeF,
I strongly suspect a Rosin Rammler plot would give a straight line. The exponential flavour of the graphs is finished, finite, complete. The top of the bell curve is nigh, if not already achieved. And the future will NOT be a beautiful bell curve, but will be a long drawn out tail. Not a hockey stick to be seen anywhere.
10
Tdef
As per WHO rules, in the UK if the person dies with CV then the cause pf death as listed as being from this disease even though they may have died WITH cv but not OF it.
In italy some 12 percent of deaths are estimated by the health autheities to be actuallyb due to cv butvagain they are compelled to list it as the cause of death even if they died with it but not OF it.
I do not know whether Oz does the same
33
Semantics. CV may not kill you, but leads to your death before your time from organ failure, like all bad flus. The cause of death might equally be listed as heart failure. However it was caused by CV.
42
Its not semantics at all if you are killed by something other than cv (underlying health reasons) but cv is listed as the reason for death because it is prsent. It is how the WHO emergency codings are being operated.
20
The chief medical officer floated that yesterday. The camera was on him at the time. I did not see if ScoMo reacted.
I think his thought process is that few countries will eliminate the virus so it will remain a threat unless there is a good vaccine or widespread immunity. If a country is not prepared to expose itself then it will be shut off from global activity.
My eldest son, his partner and their young son live in the UK near Cambridge. The grandson brought home a bug from child care just before UK was locked down. All three had sniffles and a bit croaky in the throat for about 4 days; now fully recovered and unlikely to get another dose this year as they are both working from home and childminding as well. I was very worried that they had CV19 but we will not know until they are tested for antibodies.
Who knows how many in Europe are now immune? There will need to be some proper population sampling for antibodies to get an idea.
60
Very much agree TdeF, this is a problem right across Australia. Western and local Australian culture has forgotten that struggle is what produces successes. Much of the older generation have seen that success is real and entirely possible. The young presume the boomers ‘stole’ all the money and opportunities, when they in fact worked to create it all, and made more of it for the young as well. And the younger generation seems to have never struggled in order to learned that so give up very easily, or more likely don’t even start, or try. They presume failure is assured, and act like victims, when the exact opposite is generally true when a person starts and does not give up. They almost always succeed and achieve in life. While those who give up easy remain victims of their own self-defeats weak mind, as they endlessly blame the richer oldies who struggled to achieve.
That’s a major failure of parenting, education and or shabby give-up easy and complain culture.
80
And they now jet all over the world for holidays in exotic locations and reach 30 without the deposit for a house and are locked out by the rent and their need for a new BMW and another holiday and getting married in the Phillipines and inviting their friends. And wonder why they reach 40 in rented accommodation, while planning their trip to Fiji and updating the car.
70
The last two weeks has given us a taste of socialism/police state existence.
Some folk must be ecstatic that they can dob in people, stifle free speech and do these things while hiding behind so-called government regulations.
How long before we have to burn our books?
132
The official number of deaths in my county of 940,000 people is 6. Their average age is 77.
There’s a stay-at-home order effective 3/30 to 4/13.
50
Great. The first is a direct consequence of the second. Exponential growth is something people cannot understand, cannot believe. And an unstressed health system can save younger people. An overwhelmed system saves no one but young people. Without lockdown and doubling every two days, the difference is only three weeks. 2^10 is 1024. And three weeks later the entire population is infected.
71
The other thing to ask is what county? The number of infections is proportional to the number of infected people in a region. A county with lots of transit and people returning from oversees will be different from one with few people traveling into and through.
50
Only at the very start. Doubling every two days without isolation, one person can infect a million in six weeks. And so can each infected person, if they move. Without restriction, the whole of Australia could be infected in two months.
When you can count the carriers, you have a chance. After that, only total isolation will stop the spread. Like all viruses, this requires human contact or close contact.
No country so far is over 0.1% of their populatio infected, so with lockdown and lockdown of borders, we can eliminate this. And islands like Taiwan, Singapore, AUstralia have the easiest path to isolation. South Korea as well as the only border is impassable.
And we have a unique opportunity to eliminate this virus from our shores completely. Then we can open for business for early May. And screen everyone coming into the country.
And while we are at it, we want to screen for the latest flus too. It is far cheaper and simpler than innoculating an entire population. And suffering thousands of unnecessary deaths each year. How much does that cost the country?
31
Errr ? How do you conclude that ?
I suspect you mean that ..”no country so far has TESTED 0.1% of their population infected “
Right here in Australia, all the tests are resulting in 1-2% of all those tested are infected !
Obviously you cannot say that is typical of the entire population, but it much more realistic than just assuming the +ve tests reported ar the total for the country !
20
If you have a case of corona virus infection, it will be massive quickly. People in serious respiratory distress. People dying. You can pretty much assume that if 99% of the population are no reporting infection, that it is not in 99% of the population. Unless you have reason to believe otherwise. THere has to be a path for this infection and in many areas there is no path. Even Tasmania is traceable to the Ruby Princess.
So all our testing resources are directed at the likely and the known. If it has escaped somehow, we will find out soon enough. Unfortunately. Especially as every GP in the country is on high alert.
41
This site is now almost completely broken. In more ways than one.
I guess that means the “job’s done”.
So it’s over and out from farmerbraun in NZ.
58
Broken? In what way?
41
Polarised.
01
It’s working fine for me. A bit slow, but not really a problem.
51
Yes there has been a huge delay for the last three weeks. It makes commenting difficult, not impossible.
51
Dont you love the internet filter….
“Protecting” us of course….
Citizen…your confinement exemption papers please….why are you out if your battery cage?
60
What surprises me, is that despite the continuous stream of comments reporting this issue, i do not recall a single response from the Mods or Jo as to the cause or anY attempt to address the problem ?
There is a noticeable reduction in posts from some of the previously “regulars” who, i suspect, just find it too time consuming and frustrating to post regularly.
30
WE are know about ‘Distributed Denial of service” attacks.
I’ve been wondering if this was happening.
But it could simply be that Jo’s Blog now attracts far more more people.
She has been right all along about the Corona 19 Virus.
While the MSM were ignoring the impact that this disease would have in Australia, Europe, USA, UL etc.
I got a reminder of this last night listening to Phillip Clarke on ABC 891.
He started repeating facts about the disease and future course
Which I have only read here in Jo’s posts.
Clearly he has been . checking them out.
And lots of other people as well I suggest.
71
The web site provider should be able to ramp up / scale up automatically as the load increases.
30
But presumably at a $ cost?
10
There was a suggestion in the past fortnight that slow response was the reason pat no longer comments here; too bad if it’s true as the pat collations were a principal reason for my coming here.
60
He didn’t get many ticks because his cut and paste approach was old hat. Presentation is important in getting the message across.
03
🙂
Stirrer.
30
Thank you.
Arohanui.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gFtT1eMvxWI
40
I have to agree. It’s broken in a number of ways. To slow at times. No ability to edit or delete ones posts without asking a moderator. Too easy to be put into moderation. I too have been thinking of leaving here. It’s a shame since it has the potential to becoming a very popular site for discussing world events by people all over the world. Then again there are plenty of other sites that do that already. I’ve been visiting them more and more of late.
41
Hi Farmer,
This might help, check out the YouTube link.
http://joannenova.com.au/2020/04/george-pell-catholic-climate-skeptic-old-white-man-vilified-demonized-finally-walks-free/#comment-2306052
00
Advice for faster posting.
Posting with Links takes the moderators extra time!
I type into a program ‘WordPad’.
I proof read and adjust this may take minutes or hours depending upon the subject matter and my input.
When I am ready to post I use ‘CtrlC’ to copy to the clip board.
I go to this site and select reply or Post and use ‘CtrlV’.
I use Preview just in case and then Post comment.
I DO NOT NEED TO SIT and wait while it gets posted.
I can go do other stuff, like thinking about other possible posts I might make.
I have not noticed any slowing down of accessing existing posts.
Yes the initial open is a little slower.
40
I hope that didn’t take hours!
Useful idea to use a simple text editor off site to avoid accidental loss of effort. I’ve often done it.
Another tip is if you are typing directly into a dialogue box and suddenly find that you have written a lot, select your text and copy it (and maybe paste into a text editor). Certainly always do this just prior to posting.
40
I’m not a computer nerd – probably not a nerd on anything much – but when I log in
I get the message ‘site not secure’.
I use Norton and read the use of such systems can slow the response rates. However, it is a modicum
slower here than on non blog sites. As some have said, is it the amount of traffic on what is a non commercial
site that depends for donations to exist?
Thanks to Jo as, no doubt, she is copping a caning from the problem, but still
persists with a lot of effort and hard yakka with all the reading, deciphering, professional presentation on multiple topics every day,
monitoring and debate. Beyond me how she does it. Perhaps will get better when she returns to the climate topic which is not so relevant currently.
30
Well said Doc !
I’ve found when Facebook is slow so is this site but I’m always struggling with speed issues since the NBN came to the area and we were forced to switch .
10
I was wondering about the difficulty of loading this site. I have to persist for a long time with lots of unable to connect messages. Do we know if this is on purpose or not?
10
Fred Singer has died. A great man indeed.
https://www.climatedepot.com/2020/04/07/rip-award-winning-atmospheric-scientist-dr-fred-singer-dies-pioneering-scientist-the-dean-of-climate-skeptical-scientists/
50
One of the best. Will be missed.
50
The latest data for Australia and Victoria on the number of new Covid19 cases:
For the week ending March 15 the average number of new daily cases was 31, and for the week ending March 22 it was 151.
For the week ending March 29, the average peaked at 376.
For the week ending April 5 the average number was 244.
And for the latest 7 day period ending on April 7 the number of new daily cases averaged 194.
For Victoria the corresponding numbers are 6, 34, 68, 52, 39 (the peak of 74 was for the week ending April 2.
Ok modellers, get to work.
What will be the earliest date when no new cases are reported?
What will be the earliest date when no new cases are reported for a full 7 days?
Test your skills. On April 7 Doherty Institute researchers released their work on COVID-19 modelling to the general public. These models have been utilised by the Commonwealth Government in the public health response to COVID-19.
This is the basis on which our governments warned of 50,000 deaths if nothing was done, and their present advice that the restrictions are likely to be in place for up to six months.
At the press conference it was indicated that updated modelling based on Australian data would be available in about three weeks.
10
Impossible to model anything without a complete data set….
..In particular you need to know the corresponding number of tests done each day.
20
To add..
If you refer to the chart in your link of…. “Percentage of Tests reported Positive”…
which is basicly the % of “New Cases” relative to test quantity..
you may notice that most states are continuing to get a constant steady % of positive results ..orounf 1.5 – 2% with no sign of that reducing !!
so at that rate, i see no chance of us ever getting to a zero new case count in the foreseeable future !
10
Chad,
The requirement for re-testing of medical staff and of ‘recovered’ patients are included in those figures and not separated in any way!
Rubbish in Rubbish out!
20
So, you agree the data we have is useless in reality without a detailed breakedown ?
At one point, NSW was reporting the number of tests , and the number of people tested….but i have not seen that lately.
10
The data we have is number of reported cases, based on testing, that is based on those reporting with symptoms.
Same with flu, we never test across the entire population.
And the good news is that the number of new cases assessed as having the virus is declining.
30
Actually NO ! Its NOT based on “those reporting with symptoms”
Its the number of positive test results from the testing of “high risk” groups. IE health care workers, Aged care workers, those known to be in contact with infected cases, those reporting to ER, etc etc
Because the number of those being tested is declining also !!
For instance ..(and detailed info is hard to find).. just considering NSW, who consistently report the majority of tests in Australia..
The last 15 days of March, the average number of daily tests was 5,300 with a peak of over 8000 in one day..
For the last 7 days that daily testing average has dropped to 3,700, with the last 2 days at only 2,000 ??
AND,…G Hunt has just been announcing how essential it is to keep increasing the amount of testing done ??
10
There’s a physical and policy aim to the scale and limits of testing which occurs. It was never expected to produce perfect data or anything remotely like that. It is blunt and only needed to produce good enough data which allows us to detect where virus exponential growth is occurring, and to disrupt it via measuring the rise and fall of symptomatic cases. Which also serve as a proxy for the asymptomatic cases in the community, which will be wiped out by isolation measures anyway, and which then eliminates the need for widespread (and quite unachievable) whole of community sampling.
40
i.e. If there’s been a 2-week period of social distancing and personal and family isolation already, a program sampling that community could expect to find very few community-spread cases emerging left to detect.
So why bother expending large test-kit resources in that area until a week after you begin to re-open the domestic Oz community? Better off saving the kits until the isolation is over and building up more of them and test capacity in the interim.
50
Modelling? Did someone mention modelling? Oh no!!!!
I thought we understood from our previous discussions on climate change models that they were useless given the theory behind them and the data used to drive the models were mostly in error. The same can be applied here. The theory is not well understood and the data is highly questionable. It has been pointed out we do not know the real number of cases since there are so many out there who have the virus but don’t know it. It’s no point using theory to estimate that number because it becomes a circular argument. Both are not well understood. I know from experience when I was doing my PhD that modelling is fraught with all sorts of problems and even when one gets the right result for a time things can get very wrong later on. My experience was mainly in dynamic deterministic modelling in atmospheric physics and I know what I’m talking about.
No, we should just continue what we are doing, right or wrong, as a precautionary measure until the number of deaths drops below an acceptable level. Who decides what that level should be is an issue though but someone has to make the call. Then the risk is what happens after the restrictions are lifted. Do we go back to square one? That’s possible but we won’t know until we try. Leave the modelling to the academics in ivory towers.
31
From an email just in
” This #coronavirus is turning me into a Labor voter…..
I’m staying at home, not working, complaining about everything, and waiting for a cheque from the government.”
131
And a pay rise.
42
Maybe not an ALP voter but certainly a socialist voter. No longer can we say there is much difference between the two major parties. Still a few but not much. Time will tell though if the LNP breaks away from the climate change/emissions reduction crap that has been placing a brake on our economic growth. Now of all time we need all brakes to be taken off to permit our economy to survive. They now have a clear excuse to do so. Whether they will remains to be seen. In fact PM Morrison could now easily remove the restriction on nuclear energy if he really had the will and the intelligence to realise the benefits that would spin off that industry alone given more people now are clamouring for a greater focus on nation building rather than relying too much on other nations. Come on PM Morrison. Are you part of the team or are you a nation destroyer. The ball is in your court PM.
40
With Easter approaching, it’s time to thank Jo for her great work by providing some emergency chocolates via the Tip Jar.
70
CHLOROQUINE TRIALS
The US National Library of Medicine site – Clinical Trials.gov lists 28 Trials involving Coronavirus and Chloroquine, either alone or in combination with other drugs
https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/results?cond=Coronavirus+Infection&term=Hydroxychloroquine&cntry=&state=&city=&dist=
One trial in Spain has actually started and is planned to run for 2 months. Most other trials are recruiting or still in the planning stages. A large trial involving the Melbourne Medical School along with several US hospitals will not be completed until Feb 2021!
All this will take far too long. There should be a place for more limited case report studies which could be completed in weeks, based on existing infections. Doctors need some clinical guidance right now.
I did like TdeF’s suggestion that passengers from the Ruby Princess be treated and use the passengers from the Diamond Princess as controls.
20
How much clinical testing is required for a commonly used cheap drug which has been on the market since 1935?
31
Clinical Testing for drug safety and side effects has been done.
Testing for effectiveness could take longer depending on how effective the drug actually is. Very high effectiveness can be apparent early on, in which case the trial may be terminated because it is unethical to deny the control patients the benefit of a proven effective therapy.
30
One thing about everyone being out of work and relying on the Government for a fortnightly payment.
People get to see how those of us living on the age pension get by ….. all the time.
And they’re getting well more than we do.
Tony.
70
For you Tony
https://twitter.com/justinwolfers/status/1247932206095491074?s=21
00
I’m glad that all this electrical power ‘stuff’ I do will soon become totally irrelevant, as there’ll be no more money for totally useless sources of renewable power like wind plants.
I don’t care what people say about how good it is, how cheap it is (neither of them true) because there are (an awful lot of) days like yesterday when wind power goes absent across the whole of Australia and if it’s so d@mned good, what do we do when there are (so many) days like this.
Wind power has a current Nameplate of 6960MW. That’s 2.64 times the Nameplate of the Bayswater coal fired power plant. (Nameplate 2640MW) Bayswater has FOUR units, each of 660MW. There are (around) 3700 Units (individual wind turbines on top of towers) of wind generation.
Yesterday, the whole of the 24 hour period, wind power delivered 21GWH of power at an average of 875MW an hour. That’s little more than what gets delivered from ONE unit at Bayswater, and that was from 3700+ wind turbines. That’s at an operational Capacity Factor (CF) for the day of 12.6%. At the low point for wind for the day, it was generating 206MW, and that’s at a CF of just under 3%, so, of those 3700 wind towers, only 110 of them had the blades actually tuning over. All up, at that time, wind power was delivering 0.9% of all generated power, so less than ONE PERCENT of the absolute power requirement for Australia.
Remind me again how much all these wind plants have cost us.
Here we have a source of power which delivered 21GWH of power for the 24 hour period, less than 4% of the generated power from every source for the whole of the Country.
Bayswater (38% of the Nameplate for wind generation) delivered that same power in the NINE HOURS from Midnight to 9.00AM from its four units, the same power as 3700+ wind towers in the whole 24 hours of the day.
Now, I couldn’t care less if wind power has days (very few and far between) when it might operate close to 50%, when, mind you, it’s still only delivering less than 3500MW average.
Just what do we do when there are the many days like this, if wind will be virtually all we have to rely upon.
Tony.
140
The government is injecting billions into the economy right now. Most of that ends up as private savings looking for a return. I expect there will be considerable flow into wind, solar and storage projects. Banks will not be lending for new coal projects and I do not see Angus Taylor promoting funding for any new coal generation.
Woolworths share price is up on this time last year. Westfarmers share price is level with same time last year. Our major grocery outlets are doing very well right now. Some people are making good money in the circumstances.
Andrews was planning to take a knife to the bloated public service in Victoria. He will be having second thoughts now because that would just drive unemployment in the State. Likewise Federal government will not want to cut numbers as it would make unemployment worse.
Australia’s food supplies relies heavily on old farmers and itinerant (visa holders) workers. If CV19 got into that part of the food chain, it could be truly damaging for Australia as I think the value of these people is grossly underestimated and old farmers difficult to replace.
Australia’s major income are iron ore and coal. Literally a handful of people can keep those operations running. Each shiploader, coal or iron ore, is able to generate between USD200 – 400 per second when operating and they typically achieve a utilisation in the range 60 to 70%. This one port has 6 coal shiploaders:
https://www.google.com.au/maps/place/Hay+Point+QLD+4740/@-21.2623342,149.2878494,6005m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x6bdbcf7acc8633a9:0x400eef17f208720!8m2!3d-21.2948785!4d149.2561568
This one port has three iron ore shiploaders:
https://www.google.com.au/maps/place/Dampier+WA+6713/@-20.6500486,116.6703662,1134m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x2bf63c12901b7c1f:0x28bc6ac359455c8c!8m2!3d-20.662122!4d116.7107712
These units are on the high end of capacity (income per second) and utilisation because there is always a ship berthed ready to load.
It appears Australia’s current account will improve through 2020 because major exports are going out at good volume and price while major imports like motor vehicles and appliances (other than freezers and computers) are down. Tourism is probably close to neutral from current account perspective. Education services will have a negative impact on current account.
40
Nice to be an optimist but I’m a realist. I’m still waiting for PM Morrison to start withdrawing from the Paris Agreement, remove the restriction on nuclear power and create incentives for the building of coal fired power stations to shore up our base load power generation capabilities. It’s now critical we do so. We no longer as a nation can afford to pretend that all will be OK by virtue signalling with renewables while ignoring the obviosu, which both major parties have been doing for so many years.
50
Percentage of new cases to active cases (i.e. current rate of spread) in all countries above 500 cases:
% New v Active | Country | Total Cases
25.4 … Peru … 2,954
20.3 … Belarus … 861
17.6 … Mexico … 2,439
16.6 … Russia … 7,497
15.8 … Bahrain … 811
14.0 … Brazil … 14,034
13.9 … France … 109,069
13.6 … Bosnia Herz … 764
13.3 … Iraq … 1,122
13.1 … UAE … 2,359
12.9 … Uzbekistan … 520
12.3 … Colombia … 1,780
12.2 … Kuwait … 743
12.2 … Turkey … 34,109
11.9 … Egypt … 1,450
11.8 … Qatar … 2,057
11.5 … Denmark … 5,071
11.4 … Azerbaijan … 717
11.2 … India … 5,311
10.9 … Serbia … 2,447
10.7 … Indonesia … 2,738
10.4 … Hungary … 817
10.3 … Ukraine … 1,462
9.7 … Singapore … 1,481
9.6 … Poland … 4,848
9.6 … Romania … 4,417
9.2 … Moldova … 1056
9.1 … Canada … 17,897
8.9 … Saudi Arabia … 2,795
8.6 … Belgium … 22,194
8.3 … Slovakia … 581
7.9 … USA … 395,612
7.6 … Pakistan … 4,035
7.4 … UK … 55,242 (8.0% yesterday, 14% the day before, finally falling)
7.2 … Chile … 5,116
7.1 … Sweden … 7,693
7.0 … Dominican Rep … 1,956
6.8 … Ecuador … 3,995
6.7 … Finland … 2,308
6.6 … Argentina … 1,715
6.6 … Iran … 62,589
6.6 … Malaysia … 3,963
6.4 … Morocco … 1,184
6.3 … Ireland … 5,709
6.2 … Spain … 141,942
6.2 … Germany … 107,663
6.0 … Portugal … 12,442
5.9 … New Zealand … 1,160
5.5 … Croatia … 1,282
5.5 … Kazakhstan … 697
5.5 … Bulgaria … 577
5.3 … N Macedonia … 599
5.2 … Luxembourg … 2,970
5.2 … Greece … 1,832
4.7 … Tunisia … 623
4.7 … Switzerland … 22,253
4.5 … Netherlands … 19,580
4.4 … Cameroon … 685
4.3 … Lithuania … 880
4.1 … Andorra … 545
4.1 … Slovenia … 1,059
4.1 … Czechia … 5,017
4.1 … Austria … 12,639
4.1 … Israel … 9,248
3.9 … Algeria … 1,468
3.9 … Estonia … 1,149
3.8 … South Africa … 1,749
3.7 … Norway … 6,086
3.2 … Italy … 135,586
3.0 … Hong Kong … 936
3.0 … Philippines … 3,764
2.8 … Thailand … 2,258
2.7 … Australia … 5,988
2.6 … Armenia … 853
2.4 … Iceland … 1,586
1.5 … Lebanon … 548
1.4 … S. Korea … 10,331
1.1 … Latvia … 548
Australia is at 2.7%, the 6th lowest spreading. If we drop active case numbers this month and end the slow community spread we’ll beat it by early to mid May. If the attitude to isolation becomes lax in the interim it’ll be later.
Percent died (countries with more than 250 cases and above 2.5% deaths):
% Died | Country | Total Cases
13.15 … Algeria … 1,468
12.63 … Italy … 135,586 (Resumed rise)
12.19 … San Marino … 279
11.15 … UK … 55,242
10.73 … Netherlands … 19,580
9.89 … Spain … 141,942
9.47 … France … 109,069
9.17 … Belgium … 22,194
8.07 … Indonesia … 2,738 (Gradually improving)
7.68 … Sweden … 7,693
7.60 … Morocco … 1,184
7.21 … Honduras … 305
6.48 … Egypt … 1,450
6.19 … Iran … 62,589
5.79 … Iraq … 1,122
5.75 … Hungary … 817
5.74 … Albania … 383
5.13 … Mexico … 2,439
5.10 … Ecuador … 3,747
5.01 … Dominican Rep … 1,956
4.95 … Burkina Faso … 384
4.89 … Brazil … 14,034
4.70 … Philippines … 3,764 (Gradually improving)
4.46 … Romania … 4,417
4.42 … Greece … 1,832
4.34 … N Macedonia … 599
4.32 … Bosnia Herz… 764
4.04 … Andorra … 545
4.00 … Denmark … 5,071
3.99 … Bulgaria … 577
3.96 … Niger … 278
3.69 … Tunisia … 623
3.69 … Switzerland … 22,253
3.68 … Ireland … 5,709
3.62 … Peru … 2,954
3.47 … Lebanon … 548
3.44 … Argentina … 1,628
3.40 … Slovenia … 1,059
3.31 … Afghanistan … 423
3.23 … USA … 394,587
3.08 … Ukraine … 1,462
2.82 … India … 5,311
2.81 … Colombia … 1,780
2.78 … Cuba … 396
2.77 … Portugal … 12,442
2.66 … Poland … 4,848
2.62 … Panama … 2,100
2.61 … Mauritius … 268
Many countries got enough warning to bolster Hospital capacity and isolated in time to stop died % rising fast.
The good news is mixed with a lot of bad news as overall the global died % has hit is highest level today of 6.07% (much higher than WHO’s 3.4% warning level last month).
Badly affected countries in Europe and North America need to reduce active cases fast to lower vulnerability to a worse second wave as Hospitals will not be out of the woods until the active patients recover.
Although it looks like improvements due to slowing of the spread, those numbers are still rising everywhere, there are now 23 countries with died % higher than 7.5%, a list which keeps getting longer each day. There are 55 countries now with a died % above 5% and their hospitals are failing.
So the isolation cycle must be made to work.
100
This was a sorting error, ignore those numbers, they’re wrong.
00
In countries with more than 100 cases, there are 13 countries where more than 7.5% of known cases have died, and 25 countries where above 5% known cases have died.
40
Good data. Thanks.
We are about to pass South Korea on stopping this. Their % of new cases is relative to double the population. In absolte terms they have just posted a day with only 50 new cases. We will pass that on the weekend.
And people are talking about stopping what we are doing and copying others, like Sweden?
Once there are no more new cases, the virus is nearly gone from our society. Why would we stop? Because someone thinks it is inevitable? We don’t have rabies, so should we introduce it? We do not want any Wuhan virus in this country and we can open for business soon after the most effective lock down in the world.
Target 0 new cases. Then the ratio to population will be irrelevant. It will be zero.
60
People who don’t grasp the exponential implications of not completely eliminating it within Australia by isolation will quite soon be arguing to reopen the national economy by the end of next week, which would just lead to it being closed once again sometime during June, for another 2 month stint. The virus has to go, and hopefully testing at borders plus case tracking and antiviral candidates now in testing keeps it under control as we re-open to international flights from other virus-eliminated countries mid-year. We can be one of the first countries clear of COVID-19 and opening up internationally, but not if we open domestically without totally eliminating community spread in Australia.
We can deal with the imported virus via a 14 day isolation (or more days if needed), for as long as it takes for countries to prove they’re clear of it, and doing the same things.
80
Fully agree. We have the unprecedented opportunity to rid our country of this killer disease forever. We should grab it with both hands. And we also have the technology to make sure it does not come back.
The old technology was to make sure anyone who came to your country was immunized, so they could not be carrying the disease. We have forgotten all about this. I think because the tourist industry is so big now, in and out of Australia. And everyone is having fun. How can it possibly hurt? And the WHO and the Americans make sure Ebola never reaches our shores. So why bother?
We have to go back to the old ways. We are no longer safe.
50
The target in my mind should be zero new cases for 14 days before we even think about opening things up again.
20
In fact we could even do that one state and territory at a time.
To quote Jo, lets crush this stupid virus.
Maybe then the rest of the world won’t be so fatalistic with regards to Covid-19.
40
For something completely different.
‘A rare hole has opened up in the ozone layer above the Arctic, in what scientists say is the result of unusually low temperatures in the atmosphere above the north pole.
‘The hole, which has been tracked from space and the ground over the past few days, has reached record dimensions, but is not expected to pose any danger to humans unless it moves further south.’
Guardian
10
Hey,
wait a minute, I thought we had all stopped using ‘Uncle Sam’.
Tony.
Link to TV Ad
40
I regularly see temps drop lower than -80C over the top of the northern polar cell in lower stratospheric forecast. But above the south polar cell they rarely drop below -58C. Low temp transients over the north polar region are common. There’s nothing out of the ordinary occurring there now so it’s likely deep cold itself has little to do with ozone depletion. The depletion area is over SE Greenland (shallows and disappears fast) and coincides with a normal cold (but more humid) anomaly from a weak residual vertical wave’s re-entry to the troposphere between Greenland and Scandinavia. I’ve see much stronger ozone depletion areas in the northern-hem over the past 6 months.
70
From: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d6MZy-2fcBw
Perspectives on the Pandemic | Dr John Ioannidis of Stanford University | Episode 1
301,375 views
•Mar 26, 2020
“Perspectives on the Pandemic Episode 1: Dealing with Coronavirus, a fiasco in the making? As the coronavirus pandemic takes hold, we are making decisions without reliable data.
“Watch episode 2 here: https://youtu.be/lGC5sGdz4kg
“Interview highlights:
00:50-Dr. Ioannidis summarizes his article titled “A fiasco in the making? As the coronavirus pandemic takes hold, we are making decisions without reliable data” (linked below)
03:47-The truth about COVID-19’s death rate
06:21-What makes COVID-19 different than the Swine Flu
08:43-How do we get accurate data on COVID-19?
09:47-The Diamond Princess Cruise Quarantine
15:12-Should everyone be tested?
16:47-Italy & COVID-19
23:06-Is self-isolation the best cure?
27:06-Medical supplies shortage in New York
29:48-But wait, what is a coronavirus?
34:00-What is this pandemic’s outcome?
36:26-Identifying COVID-19 cases
38:59-Why is COVID-19 putting a stress on the medical system?
41:22-The “New Normal” in the face of COVID-19
43:36-Is the cure worse than the disease?
46:55-Are we over-preparing for the affects of COVID-19?
47:55-The role of politics in the United States’ COVID-19 response
49:23-Are the current isolation orders creating a bigger problem?
52:20-High risk populations
53:39-Biases in our COVID-19 response
56:11-The World Health Organization’s role
57:40-What can we learn from this pandemic?
1:01:33-How long will the COVID-19 lockdown last?
“Dr John P.A. Ioannidis is a professor of medicine and professor of epidemiology and population health, as well as professor by courtesy of biomedical data science at Stanford University School of Medicine, professor by courtesy of statistics at Stanford University School of Humanities and Sciences, and co-director of the Meta-Research Innovation Center at Stanford (METRICS) at Stanford University.”
“See his thoughts in writing here:
https://www.statnews.com/2020/03/17/a…
20
Good commentary..
WXc and TdF should read/watch that and at least try to understand what is being said. !
21
I will add John Ioannidis to my list of dingbats who cannot see the bleeding obvious. Wanting more data in the circumstances before implementing lockdowns is suicidal. It is akin to entering a burning house to measure the temperature inside. All you need to know is that it can kill lots of people if unchecked.
One simple question – when was the last time a British PM, in robust health 10 days ago, was in hospital in critical care receiving oxygen just suffering from the seasonal flu?
71
Until random testing of PM’s in general is adopted, the answer to your question is not available in a reliable form.
Here is some hope…
From: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-04-03/random-coronavirus-testing-begins-in-canberra/12119364
‘Random’ coronavirus testing to begin in Canberra next week at drive-through centre and clinic
Updated April 03, 2020 17:37:08
10
Imagine if they randomly tested politicians for brain function. !
50
Episode 2 with Knut Wittkowski was impressive.
00
There will be a test of Hydroxychloroquin in Texas City, Texas.
83 people at the aged care facility have tested positive. This is a disaster in the making. From the Governor down there is approval to give Hydroxychloroquine to 30 of these people.
Based on past result we will know in days if it is effective. We have to hope that the success rate is high. These people have an appalling risk level. You would expect roughly five of the 30 to die and the harm
to the other substantial. And the ones not getting the drug are effectively a comparison group. If the control group recover very quickly, you can expect the rest are treated. The world does not have time for the double negative studies and if no one dies, which is the greatest hope and people recover quickly, we have confirmation and around 13 lives could be saved in one place.
90
Proper La Nina developing.
BOM Pacific subsurface plot:
http://www.bom.gov.au/cgi-bin/oceanography/wrap_ocean_analysis.pl?id=IDYOC007&year=2020&month=04
60
Good catch, BoM is not game to say.
‘Six of the eight climate models surveyed by the Bureau indicate that ENSO is likely to stay neutral through the southern hemisphere winter, meaning it may have limited influence on Australian and global climate in the coming months. The remaining two models suggest La Niña may develop during winter.
‘However, ENSO predictions made during autumn tend to have lower accuracy than predictions made at other times of the year. This means that current ENSO forecasts beyond May should be used with some caution.’
40
Email from my State representative today. He is in opposition. This is the first part:
This is the link to the opinion poll:
https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/LPlateFine
That is it!!!! Woopee.
There were some other more useful links.
10
Destroy 99.9% of viruses in 1/10th of a second.
00
is that the nuclear option?
00
Isolation imbibation possibly.
10
Non thermal plasma.
https://thenextweb.com/syndication/2019/05/10/this-cool-gas-technology-could-kill-99-9-of-deadly-germs-in-the-air/
20
The number of new infections reported today is just under 100 at 98. There must be some new sources of infection, some new communities like Burnie in Tasmania or perhaps the Ruby Princess is still contributing.
Let’s hope it drops suddenly tomorrow. I have that champagne ready for the weekend.
It will be the first time a country has destroyed a virus, let alone in a few weeks. Then put up the testing barricades. Because Australia could be the world’s favorite place soon.
60
And if we can test for this corona virus, perhaps all the others. And tuberculosis. And measles. And rhinoviruses and all the rest. That will also make the planes and cruise ships safe for their passengers,
which will do a lot to repair the industry.
In this world, we want to be the masters of the RNA, not victims. No longer helpless victims. This world tragedy may be the turning point in the eons long battle between species and viruses, dumb deadly parasites. And not just for us, for the dogs and cats and horses too. A test for the related virus of Hendra. And track down Lupus in bats.
Our new high tech army will take up a fight which has defined illness and created the need for antibody defences. We know about it in computers and our knowledge of DNA allows us to take the same technology and approach to human health. Isolate, eradicate, defend.
50
It might be cheaper and less invasive to exterminate Asian bats. We shouldn’t stop there, influenza must be consigned to history.
20
Has anyone got numbers for the ordinary flu score…? We must be close to half time..
The ordinary flu must be getting hammered by the mammal team..
30
105 now.
10
And I have to say it through clenched teeth, the only one talking real sense is Daniel Andrews. He has his story right and he is determined. I am amazed.
40
I agree, but does he have to enjoy making his announcements so much. He’s positively gloating.
It’s as if he’s loving the control and power.
10
Hi GD,
I was thinking the same, both for Daniel and Jacinda. Scratch a socialist and you’ll find a little despot just below the surface, methinks.
Cheers,
Speedy
00
“Destroy 99.9% of viruses in 1/10th second.”
As per my post above.
Just wait for the posted link to be moderated and appear…
Insert crickets chirping sound…
I post but don’t jump through hoops.
10
This fellow wasn’t thinking on his feet.
‘Man fined $1000 after being stopped while walking on Bathurst footpath.
‘The 41-year-old man offered several different reasons for being out of his home …’
Western Advocate
10
When the story first came out there was concern around town that a casual stroll could land people in hot water.
The twitter sphere ran hot and it was eventually revealed the gentleman in question had just arrived back from overseas and was supposed to be in isolation for two weeks. So, guilty as charged.
10
Hi Jo
Did anyone else see that press conference by a WHO official who said that now that people are locked down in their homes it was time to send police in to drag out any family members showing symptoms and force them into some other isolation facility?
I know Jo that you are keen for a strong lock down policy but do you think this might be going toooooo far? They could probably get away with it in Aus where we seem happy for over zealous police to chase us out of parks etc. but imagine what would happen in the US. A gunfight on every doorstep!
Why is it that these international bodies always tend towards fascist methods to control people? Because they are stacked with Communist and Socialist stooges?
80
WHO wants the Chinese solution !
After all China has bought out the WHO lock stock & barrel !
Sack Tedros !
50
US is winning. Total deaths forecast now down to 60k.
New York daily toll of 791 is now shown as the peak daily toll; original forecast peak some weeks back was 855.
UK daily death toll is forecast to peak at 2,932 on 17 April. Total deaths at 66k; now forecast higher toll than USA.
50
More questions
“Wuhan Flu: A Lung Disease Or A Blood Disease?”
http://www.smalldeadanimals.com/index.php/2020/04/07/wuhan-flu-a-lung-disease-or-a-blood-disease/
20
John Hewson talks a lot of nonsense.
https://theconversation.com/sorry-to-disappoint-climate-deniers-but-coronavirus-makes-the-low-carbon-transition-more-urgent-135419
40
Hi El Gordo. We wouldn’t expect any different for the good doctor. John Hewson might be wrong, but he’s consistently wrong.
Cheers,
Mike
60
Well if that’s the case and it’s urgent the solution is obvious and now very easily instigated thanks to the river of money. Build nuclear power stations funded by the loans from the federal government. Simples. Of course it’s not going to happen because it’s all a hoax and PM Morrison I think knows it but has no spine to stand up to the nonsense. He’s more interested in being a career politician like the rest of them. Perhaps the current two crises will wake him up and change his attitude. Let’s hope so. We need to start rebuilding this nation ASAP.
30
No nuclear power stations on my watch, but a lot of that $130 billion set up for the Corona crusade would be returned to consolidate revenue. Which could be spent on new dams and coal fired power stations.
In other news.
A report out of Hong Kong shows ‘cats can transmit the virus to other cats, which has prompted the Australian Veterinary Association to wear personal protective equipment when handling cats with COVID-19 positive owners.’
Weatherzone
20
Don’t worry Australia won’t be building any nuclear reactors. We are too immature for that sort of serious power generation. I don’t actually give a damn which way we go, nuclear and/or coal. We have plenty of coal but the problem is Australia is immature in the other sense; too many still believe we need to reduce our emissions drastically. That’s why I prefer the nuclear option; kills two birds with one stone so to speak. It also placed the cat among the pigeons I would love to see the Greenies go nuts over the idea of going nuclear. They hate nuclear more than anyone, although you sound you are on their side on that point.
50
Because it is sustainable and makes economies stable.
20
John Hewson, globulist esquire: https://theconversation.com/sorry-to-disappoint-climate-deniers-but-coronavirus-makes-the-low-carbon-transition-more-urgent-135419
‘Deniers argue that further disruption to economies and societies will be avoided at all costs.
Sorry to be the harbinger of denier disappointment, but there is every reason to expect that the virus crisis will strengthen and accelerate the imperative to transition to a low-carbon world by mid-century.’
Do – not – forget that ’twas the globalists that campaigned for unmonitored open border immigration … yer Angela, yer Christina …
110
Hewson is very well off. Would love to know how much he has at risk, invested in
anything green. Could be getting a bit worried soon as some of those windmills run into
redundancy, need to be replaced. That’s a very, very expensive procedure which in some places has
been handled by being left to rot.
50
I guess most of us have lived tough lives but there’s no way I’d want to swap mine for his.
How could he get to the end of his life, look back and see wealth derived from having lived a Lie.
What an achievement.
KK
20
John Hewson and The Conversation; seriously, you expect us to jump into that slime pit?
30
I prefer to stay clean
The nuggets of gold are very few !
20
The Chinese Flu has come at tremendous cost. Who is going to pay for this? May, I suggest, the Chinese. They didn’t learn from SARS, they are not learning from COVID, so maybe they’ll learn when Chairman Xi gets an envelope from the rest of the world with the bill for this little fiasco.
Don’t think it should happen? We in the West are paying big time for the climate “damage” that we’re supposed to have done, and the Chinese seem to have done something a lot more serious and nowhere near as abstract as what we’re seeing in our cities today.
Don’t think the Chinese will pay? I don’t either. If nothing else, humility is not their strong suite, and they’re not so good at justice when it doesn’t suit them. But if they don’t pay for the damage from the flu, then we perhaps should stop paying for the “damage” to the climate.
Bail out of Paris, right now. Because we can, and we should.
Cheers,
Mike
20
We don’t need herd immunity. This virus, if not passed from victim to victim, will disappear, just as SARS did, because it only replicates in the bodies of victims.
So isolate, and as TdeF has stated, we are past the peak, and there could be close to zero new cases by May 1. That’s why some countries are already easing the isolation.
40
The BBC trying to be useful has compiled this video from Wuhan residents
With tips on how to cope for those going through it now.
Actually moving & good.
https://www.bbc.com/news/av/world-asia-china-52210273/coronavirus-please-learn-from-wuhan-s-mistakes
10
“It is fair to ask about the numbers.”
http://www.smalldeadanimals.com/index.php/2020/04/08/it-is-fair-to-ask-about-the-numbers/
00
After watching the Bolt Report tonight there appears to be a good explanation why Pell is targeted so much and so hard by certain people. They have a slight mental issue that causes them to think they experienced something that didn’t actually happen. It sounds plausible. Of course there are still those why are just plain evil and hate Pell so much they turn a bind eye to the real evidence he is innocent.
110
For my pains of now being 43 days in self- imposed isolation whilst conforming to my country’s safe distancing regulations at all times when shopping or collecting medicine, I have been looking very closely at the way statistics and computer models influence decision making across much of what we do.
I conclude, deluded as I may be from within the confines of my lock and key environment, that our obsession with these modelling and marketing influences may yet kill us rather than cure us.
Statistics are always historic and anybody who thinks you can predict the future by using a computer model based around them is foolishly mistaken. Models most certainly guide insurers and bookmakers etc., about ‘risk’ and ‘probability’ but ‘chance’ and ‘randomness’ will always play much larger roles. Like a gambler who discovers the perfect system to break a casino, they’ll quickly find how the casino can change things around when they know what is going on, computer or no computer.
Is coronavirus the gambler or the casino system and how many variations does it have up its sleeve no matter how carefully we research it? It isn’t a computer and so it can handle infinity pretty well I’d have thought.
In the eighty four years of us knowing about corona virus existence it can still cause alarm, panic, crisis, media sensationalism, statistical meltdown, and inadequate responses when it appears. It doesn’t surprise everyone though because a few people do appear to learn from their experiences and plan shead.
Is our panic response because we rely far too heavily upon what computer models say a virus can do to us and much too lightly on what practical measures we should always have in place to deal with any outbreak of this kind?
We should be building appropriate defensive plans, having them confidence tested on an annual basis, and ensuring adequate investment in their state of art. We can do this if we remember just how much damage the 2020 outbreak did to us because we didn’t prepare properly despite adequate warning (SARS) and were just too damned complacent by magnitudes.
60
Agree entirely Lass.
If the same emotion we are witnessing at present was directed toward road fatalities, we would have a set of traffic lights at every intersection and built-up area speed limit would be 20kph.
10
Only if you think 3,000 deaths = 150,000 deaths (or maybe half a million) plus unknown number of permanently lung damaged, neurologically affected survivors. Plus extra deaths from cancer, stroke, heart disease.
Doctors are discussing the ethics of leaving if they can’t get medical masks (and all the ones I know are struggling to get PPE). At what point would you admit this was “different”.?
21
Hi Jo,
One of the biggest lessons to come out of this crisis has been what we have learned about our “Governments”.
You point out the failure to have adequate PPE on hand for this emergency: we have all seen the very public display of border force which enabled the CV19 to enter Australia in an appalling case of commercial interest over national health.
As a number of contributors have observed, government has failed to prepare for this crisis and the ramifications of the National CV19 Shutdown of 2020 are still poorly assessed. Be apprehensive about our future.
With all of the university education in Australia we should have more evidence of clear logical thinking, but it’s totally absent.
Leadership: AWOL.
KK
30
Jo,
We have over 1,000 road deaths each year in Australia along, but no talk of stop lights at every intersection.
00
Jo, as regards to the idea of ‘difference’ between seasonal ‘flu and Covid-19, I can identify many factors that may have overtly influenced the way we think about it, but have we been covertly dealt a pack of lies?
For starters this virus travelled further and faster from onset because of more than doubling in air passenger traffic since the SARS epidemic. Globalisation has clearly impacted upon the way our civilisation behaves. We know this virus has long chosen to better and better adapt itself to environments where it can naturally expect to spread with maximum efficiency among its host. If Covid-19 can replicate quickly in our throats then it can certainly spread person to person much more quickly and easily than any before it. As is usual with any bad influenza season this virus has a pivotal role in contributing to an increase in deaths of people over the age of sixty five via pneumonia, comorbidity, etc.
But is any of this enough to justify an indefinite lockdowns and economic fallout of 2020 rather than carefully planned, focused and thought through testing, isolation, and sensible preventive measures for those in the high risk groups?
From my perspective the almost obsessive panic response in many places has suggested that certain governments have been caught with pants down, knowing their plans to protect their health resources were embarrassingly short on manpower, space, PPE, testing kits etc., and isolation and treatment facilities, and that if these people and places were to be overwhelmed then the political fall-out might really kick their sorry asses into oblivion. Hence the need for politicians and public servants using a compliant media to upscale the seriousness of a virus that has little or no effect on four out of every five people it infects. That figure, of itself, is pretty meaningless since we do not know (and we may never know) how many people have actually been infected, got over it, and are perfectly healthy but stuck at home at a politician’s pleasure if they are not queueing to shop or out exercising.
We are also seemingly unable to measure the SARS-CoV-2 epidemic as compared to a bad ‘flu year because we have never before had a day by day media picture of a pandemic where lockdown has been either necessary or enforced. That is the real ‘difference’ IMO.
I offer up some alternative viewing. Whilst I accept that Sam Vaknin may not be to everybody’s taste, he makes sense of the coronavirus panic in his YouTube videos (search his name for links) and also sensitively demonstrates why it helps us as a species when large numbers of people are infected by a virus. He also places into perspective the reverse situation and what happens next. I wish there were more people like him giving us their honest views instead of the numbskulls who appear regularly with their lies and deceits.
Apologies for length.
01
UK WEather lass. No one has upscaled any threat. They downplayed it for too long. Stupidly the media fell for the Chinese “it’s just the flu” propaganda for a whole month. Sadly some citizens are still falling for it.
President Xi applauds those who say “it’s the flu”.
Think how it will work to Xi’s advantage if western competitors open up too soon and lapse back into raging infections which need a more crippling and longer subsequent lockdown. Then he has more customers over a barrel who desperately need more masks and drugs that only China can help with?
Meanwhile something deadly is out there that doubles every 2 days and we have the chance to extinguish it, so we can all get back to business. I’m not sure why you want to stretch the lockdown on longer?
I’m glad we agree that 4/5 people get something like a normal cold or flu.
But since when was it OK for 20% of the population to face a dire health threat?
20
Speaking of modelling, I was thinking today that right now would be the perfect time to hold the population census because everyone’s home. (Australia’s next census will be August 2021.) However that would play havoc with short-term migration patterns because normally a certain percentage of people would be elsewhere. Then there’s interstate and overseas migration – can’t happen at the moment. Also fertility and mortality rates would be vastly different. So all the input parameters for population projections will be abnormal. All past population projections will need to be adjusted for the 2020-21 trend break.
Therefore, it’s probably best that the census will not be until next year. However the US has their once-a-decade census every year ending in “0”. Oops!
30
Supposed bad coral bleaching back in the MSM e.g.:-
https://more.talktalk.co.uk/news/2020/04/08/survey-reveals-renewed-coral-bleaching-at-australias-great-barrier-reef
40
Of course. You cannot have a real disaster hogging all the news.
30
And I have yet to read headlines blaming the Wuhan virus on Climate Change. They will come in time. Greta can “how dare they’ to the Chinese Communist Party. See how well that works.
For now it’s another round of bleached coral and suffering polar bears I guess.
40
Wrong, wrong, wrong.
Greta will blame the virus on Trump – and the woke/wets will love it.
20
On Monday, Dr. Robert Redfield, the Director of the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), appeared on AM 1030 KVOI Radio in Tucson, Arizona, and said that the statistics have dramatically changed since the nation began the stay-at-home campaign.
Redfield said that the number of deaths now looks on track to be “much, much, much lower” than previously projected.
The doctor noted that the nation’s actions as a whole seriously impacted the models used to project the number of deaths. He added that, “those models that were done, they assume only about 50 percent of the American public would pay attention to the recommendations. In fact, what we’re seeing is a large majority of the American public is taking the social distancing recommendations to heart. And I think that’s the direct consequence of why you’re seeing the numbers are going to be much, much, much lower than would have been predicted by the models.”
So what has really surprised and pleased everyone involved is that regardless of the grandstanding by the media and the Democrats in the US, the people are solidly behind doing what they can to stop this thing. As in Australia.
And they listen carefully to Donald Trump’s addresses, which really annoys the media who keep trying to cut away and even talk over the President.
As in Australia, they are miles ahead of any projections. Americans do not want this Wuhan virus in their lives. Nor do Australians.
We have had enough of the killer invaders. And if we can test for this Corona virus, we can test for the rest. We, the people, want this tacit acceptance of mass deaths by virus to stop.
And the politicians might get behind it, once they understand it. And if sacrifices have to be made, fine. It’s far less devastating than any other type of war.
90
TdeF,
Excellent.
20
Interesting video of a professor with twenty years head of The Rockefeller University’s Department of Biostatistics, Epidemiology, and Research Design:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lGC5sGdz4kg&feature=youtu.be
Call it a contra-view? Maybe an explanation of China and South Korea. Maybe why Sweden’s current protocol (or lack thereof, may have endpoint(s) about the same, or better, as active containment.
He does use “flu” as a generic so some will dismiss this as babbling. But see 11:50 to 15:40 for contra-argument ref. the “lockdown/social distancing” by China and S. Korea. Then he discusses impact of airborne viruses.
And he’s not casting data projections forward but looking backward at reported data.
21
He’s highly credible.
11
Thank you cedarhill.(i also found virus expert Dr Frank Ryan recently.)
Watching it again.
21
Professor Knut Wittkowski is riveting in the interview.
11
He is a core member of
‘Save Our Virus Society’
SOVS !
As Sweden demonstrates this does NOT END well.
Like TdeF I believe we should destroy t
These RNA strings of chemical molecules.
They are toooooo dangerous !
21
Reeeeeely?
01
Cederhil,
Your remarks are full of BS & Crap.
You write “Maybe why Sweden’s current protocol (or lack thereof, may have endpoint(s) about the same, or better, as active containment.”
Go look at the actual figures for Sweden with it ‘herd immunity’ policy.
There are 8419 people infected.
687 people have died
726 people were infected yesterday
The death rate is running at 68 people per million.
And the population is ~10 million.
Compare that to Australia
6000 infected
50 people have died
25 persons infected yesterday
The death rate is 2 per million
And our population is ~23.5 million
Compared to Australia Sweden is bloody disaster. Their government deserves a huge kick up the bum because it is killing people !
But maybe that means nothing to you.
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/#countries
21
Bill, ‘herd immunity’ is a fundamental biological principal, not a political policy or party, or a football team score.
You have not listened to the interview and quote cedarhill instead of Professor Knut Wittkowski.
31
I know foreign BS when I smell it
I do not give it the time of day
Nor should you.
A German arrogant ‘expert’ who want us to let the bloody thing rip.
Instead of doing his wonderful youtubes
Why doesn’t he join the front line care givers and take his bloody chances with this deadly disease ?
00
Captain, that’s a highly emotive and opinionated comment.
Is there a link?
11
Comment #44.2 above
00
Thank you cedar hill, that interview was very interesting. Much food for thought there.
11
Stunning viral info. Indeed without retroviral protein Syncytin, mammals would not have a working placenta.
From: https://journals.plos.org/plosbiology/article?id=10.1371/journal.pbio.3000028
PLoS Biol. 2018 Oct 9;16(10):e3000028. doi: 10.1371/journal.pbio.3000028. eCollection 2018 Oct.
The placenta goes viral: Retroviruses control gene expression in pregnancy.
“Abstract
“The co-option of endogenous retroviruses (ERVs) is increasingly recognized as a recurrent theme in placental biology, which has far-reaching implications for our understanding of mammalian evolution and reproductive health. Most research in this area has focused on ERV-derived proteins, which have been repeatedly co-opted to promote cell-cell fusion and immune modulation in the placenta. ..
From: https://www.virology.ws/2017/12/14/a-retrovirus-gene-drove-emergence-of-the-placenta/
“Retroviruses turned egg-layers into live-bearers
14 December 2017
“Without retroviruses, many species might still be laying eggs – and that includes humans.”
10
Am not seeing it discussed much here, but emerging studies looking at the virus as causing severe disease by liberating Fe2+/Fe3+ ions from red blood cells and those nasty oxidising agents at a cellular level causing cellular destruction are interesting.
https://chemrxiv.org/articles/COVID-19_Disease_ORF8_and_Surface_Glycoprotein_Inhibit_Heme_Metabolism_by_Binding_to_Porphyrin/11938173
20
Very, very interesting research !
It’s a pity that only the abstract is presented there.
I wanted to read the whole paper.
10
Thought the exact same thing Bill…
It really speaks volumes to how early days this line of thinking is.
The implication that there is a general oxygenation problem leading to multiple organ failure and neurological damage because the blood itself cannot carry oxygen when it gets to that point.
If I get this darn thing, I have a couple of bottles of VitC ready to hit it with ASAP! 30-50mg/Kg body weight per day spread over the day they say 😉
00
I can see the whole paper and I don’t think it is because of workplace privilege. There is an up/down arrow and a free pdf download.
10
UK Virus ALERT
The English are feeling the pinch in relation to recent virus threat and have therefore raised their threat level from “Miffed” to “Peeved.” Soon, though, level may be raised yet again to “Irritated” or even “A Bit Cross.”
The English have not been “A Bit Cross” since the blitz in 1940 when tea supplies nearly ran out.
The virus has been re-categorized from “Tiresome” to “A Bloody Nuisance.” The last time the British issued a “Bloody Nuisance” warning level was in 1588, when threatened by the Spanish Armada.
The Scots have raised their threat level from “Pissed Off” to “Let’s Get the Bastard.” They don’t have any other levels. This is the reason they have been used on the front line of the British army for the last 300 years.
The French government announced yesterday that it has raised its alert level from “Run” to “Hide.” The only two higher levels in France are “Collaborate” and “Surrender.” The rise was precipitated by a recent fire that destroyed France’s white flag factory, effectively paralyzing the country’s military capability.
Italy has increased the alert level from “Shout Loudly and Excitedly” to “Elaborate Military Posturing.” Two more levels remain: “Ineffective Combat Operations” and “Change Sides.”
The Germans have increased their alert state from “Disdainful Arrogance” to “Dress in Uniform and Sing Marching Songs.” They also have two higher levels: “Invade a Neighbour” and “Lose.”
Belgians, on the other hand, are all on holiday as usual; the only threat they are worried about is NATO pulling out of Brussels.
The Spanish are all excited to see their new submarines ready to deploy. These beautifully designed subs have glass bottoms so the new Spanish navy can get a really good look at the old Spanish navy.
Australia, meanwhile, has raised its alert level from “No worries” to “She’ll be alright, Mate.” Two more escalation levels remain: “Crikey! I think we’ll need to cancel the barbie this weekend!” and “The barbie is cancelled.” So far, no situation has ever warranted use of the final escalation level.
The Russians have said “It’s not us”
120
The Russians are correct, BUT where does China stand (and WHO).
20
Nice one Mike!
40
Bernie Sanders has pulled the pin on the election leaving sleepy creepy uncle Joe a free run to challenge Trump .
I’m guessing if Trump uses Bidens own dementia ridden speeches as advertising it’s going to be an extremely easy win for Trump.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=AeRIByWjdnE
20
“Flattening The Curve”
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/04/08/flattening-the-curve/
10
Worth thinking about
“Pelling the Cat on Regulation”
http://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/04/08/pelling-the-cat-on-regulation/
10
Of the now total 6,000 Covid19 cases in Australia and 50 deaths, 2,500 recovered, all this in just 3 weeks since the virus really hit Australia. Active cases now 3,161, down from peak of 5,077.
Number of new daily cases reported down to 105 from peak of 460 just 11 days ago. (7 day rolling average now 166 from peak of 403.
If this trend continues, Australia could be close to zero new cases in another week.
But given the 2-3 week lag in number of deaths, could still be another 30 deaths.
20
Nobody calls it the Tedros Virus? Odd.
20
Serp I was just laughing at a Facebook post that said there had been another fatal case of the Clintonvirus , seems the Pentagon staffer who blew the whistle on willie and Lewinsky had died .
https://newspunch.com/clinton-whistleblower-who-exposed-bills-affair-insulted-hillary-found-dead/?fbclid=IwAR0YekBdVkgaMah2uyPakXGZvcCEm0LQ3HZpSUR0no-0NpRj9_Xo6-JPwAs
10
Had to pick up a script again this week for exactly the same drugs I bought last week but with one major difference , I forgot to remind my doc to tick the ” no substitute ” box .
Last week I had to argue to get exactly what was prescribed and this week I was told one of the drugs ( Maxalon) was not stocked by them at all !
After another short argument it was agreed that yes they did have them last week and in fact yes they still have them this week , can’t wait till next week but then I’ll remember to get that box ticked on the script and will just pop it on the counter without saying a word and see if they substitute anyway .
10
“Delingpole: ‘Trust the Experts on Coronavirus’. Sure. Which Experts?”
https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2020/04/09/trust-the-experts-on-coronavirus-sure-which-experts/
“Well maybe they will, maybe they won’t. No offence to the University of Washington but when I read the phrase “modelling by researchers” I know we are operating in the realms of purest fantasy.
That’s because I’m a climate sceptic and I’ve seen it all before.
The fact that computer models are unreliable — often based on the junkiest of junk data inputs; programmed with the shonkiest and most politically motivated algorithms, put together by people you wouldn’t trust to run a bath let alone dictate government policy — is the single most important thing you need to know about the entire global warming/climate change scam. This was the basis of the 2009 Climategate scandal: that the scientists were pushing a radical, disruptive, economically damaging agenda without any solid supporting evidence.”
And more.
20
Also consider at the age of 50 your body produces around 50% less Vitamin D from sun exposure.
10
^^^^. ??? I have heard of “Sleep Walking”, but i didnt realise “SLEEP POSTING”. Was possible ??
That is not a post from me !..i was asleep at the time.!
either there has been some “cross posting glitch” ,..or someone has hijacked my login ?
Will anyome own up or clarify who made the post ….( its too knowledgeable to be me !)
00
Victoria’s police should be held in disgrace over its vendetta against Cardinal Pell.
My understanding is despite no complaints against Cardinal Pell, the police opened up an investigation file. Then it effectively invited the public to file complaints against him.
But the most telling point about Victoria’s police is that they pressed some 26 charges against Pell over a period of time and every single one of those charges was thrown out by the courts.
The saddest thing is that despite the High Court demonstrating a gross miscarriage of justice was done to Cardinal Pell, effectively declaring him not guilty of any abuse charges, the persecution continues.
10