Originally Posted by
aviation_enthus
Sweden and other countries that went through a proper wave in March/April have plenty of “good news stories” about how to protect the vulnerable.
Yes they had a high death rate amongst aged care homes. But within this bad news there are numerous stories of homes with NO deaths. They were the ones that were proactive and moved ahead of the government rules.
Things like:
- staff are only allocated to one centre
- preventing cross contamination between areas within individual centres
- limiting or stopping family visits during high case numbers
- no casual staff (all staff have paid sick leave so they will actually stay home when slightly ill)
- proper PPE training and equipment for staff members
- providing proper medical care (including oxygen) to COVID patients within aged care homes
Most of these things DID NOT happen in Australia as well. Especially in the Federally regulated centres. Even today its only VOLUNTARY that staff restrict themselves to working in one centre!!!
It’s not rocket science. The virus has been in the world for over 6 months now. There’s more than enough evidence of things that have worked to aim for better rules and regulations. We don’t have to reinvent the wheel. We don’t even have to come up with some brilliant plan. Just proper allocation of resources were the threat actually lies (over 70’s) would be a good start.
Open the borders between states.
Masks in all shopping centres, buses etc.
Protect our aged care homes and prioritise services that allow over 70’s to avoid public areas as much as possible (like home delivery, home medical visits, etc).
Let the rest of us get back to work as much as possible. The only thing saving us so far is JobKeeper. Watch how fast public sentiment changes next year when unemployment really starts to bite. When more people start losing homes.
Again I thank you for putting in a effort in your reply.
I will start with Sweden - The Swedish constitution prevents a lock-down in peace time. The government agency responsible :- in this case the Public Health Agency must initiate all actions (recommendations) to prevent the virus in accordance with Swedish law.
The Swedish public is expected to follow a series of "NON- VOLUNTARY" recommendations from the responsible government agency. On 18 March, the Health Agency recommended that everyone should avoid travelling within the country, on 13 May this "recommendation" was softened to "commonsense travel" 1-2 hrs from home. This was mostly lifted about 3 months later on 13 June. Mobile phone tracking revealed most people followed the recommendations.
I could be mistaken,
but that sounds like the lock-down you are having when you are not having a lock-down.
It is worth noting Sweden does not have internal borders unlike Australia, it is about double the size of Victoria with roughly double the population.
Sweden certainly has a high number of deaths (even following recommendations) it is very high compared to other Nordic countries. On current measurable data the slump in the economies is similar with other Nordic countries and without sign it will improve faster than other countries. Sweden had schools and universities closed and other measures were taken, but most think it was mostly a free to do anything approach because the government did not (could not) make rules.
In Australia we have known via many media reports that our aged care has been very bad, highlighted by numerous current affairs shows over more than a decade - WE have done nothing to address this, the old Jack system at play.
That said 2017-18 more than 1.2 million people received aged care services (over 65) only 7% (84,000) accessed residential aged care (aged care homes).
22% (264,000) accessed subsidised support at home.
71% (852,000) without subsidised support at home.
So the vast majority of the vulnerable elderly people live at home and get visited by age care worker/s varying times a week mostly by staff on close to the minimum wage. While it is easy to lock-down an aged care home, that will only protect around 7% of that group (age only) of vulnerable people. The rest are spread throughout the community and with restrictions removed will be exposed to greater community transmission - age care workers, home delivery, medical visits, gardener, plumber are all a greater risk of transmission to them than now.
Then there are the other vulnerable groups - one being around 800,000 Aboriginal and Torres Straight Islander people.The science over the last 6 months proves we do not have enough evidence on what has worked, heard immunity is a perfect example or if it is possible to catch the same strain twice? Obviously after 6 months it is not possible to know what long term health impacts are on mild severe cases after recovery. Even the at risk age ranges from 50 to 60 and 70 (a lot of people 50 up to 69).
I am not sure we have the ability or the resources to protect the vulnerable, it is a far greater task than locking up the aged care facilities. If of course there is sincerity in protecting all the vulnerable in a partly humane way.
I am also guessing that most of Australia's individual wealth is held by around the 60ish age group - might not be the best idea economically, to isolate them - that could be a spectacular backfire.