Just noticed a comment at 21stC by Steve
IMV the reason Taiwan has dodged the bullet so well is because they do not have much to do with China [should have been are not having much to do with people traffic from China at the moment] and yet their intelligence services are obviously very focused on it and good enough to pick up on this type of issue. They learned early that the Chinese government were frantically dealing with an out of control virus AND that they were contemptibly not saying much publicly about it [but shutting down the people movement between the 2 zones]!
So, the Taiwanese took action themselves to shut down the limited [not really limited at all but they quickly shut down the people movement] connections they did have and then proceeded to do bugger all to warn the rest of the world! So this woman ‘leader’ who knew what was coming, is only one step down in culpability from the rats of the Chinese fascists and the rats in WHO! Not a leader or government to be praised and nothing to do with being a woman! But they looked out for No 1, and in doing so in this manner will be slaughtered in the economic crash that they could have helped to alleviate to some extent (but that is another matter and it now looms for discussion).
Australia, having been saved by the season and the still extended good weather is the 55th country ranked by population at 25.2 million and currently @62 deaths has about 2.46 deaths per million.
Coincidentally Taiwan is ranked 56th at 23.8. and has about .25 deaths per million!
Your other women ‘leaders’ are running countries that are currently seeing deaths at the following rates;
Denmark 5.7Mil @ 52 per million
Germany 83.5 @42
Norway 5.4 @26 (this will rise more I think)
Iceland 0.34 @23
Finland 5.5 @12
Finally and also lucky with the weather and also a bit more isolated than even Australia
New Zealand 4.8 @1.88
There is very little in this between Oz and NZ.. Just 1 cruise ship difference in effect.
The season and weather are notable for the staggering difference in ‘viral load’ conditions across the world.
Even in Finland it seems that they were spared a bit by having so bad weather that they just weren’t mixing as much when it hit compared to Stockholm in Sweden etc.
Now consider Spain, Italy, France and the UK! Then finally the US.
Spain @397
Italy @348
France @241
UK @178 But these figures seem underestimates (France as well) because they are not counting deaths in aged care etc. It’s all we have to go on at the moment. No one believes China, Russia etc and places that mostly can’t test!
Note Sweden for example has @102 (having taken a do almost nothing except protect the vulnerable approach).
U.S. @79 currently looks like
Good weather California @20
Flu season New York @552
So there are radical differences going on and not just when the hospitals are overrun.
Obviously these numbers are just the start (as there is still no treatment that is a clear winner) and till a vaccine or effective treatment there is going to be several waves of this. If a vaccine can be developed soon… we have not yet been able to solve the common cold; so they might not get one for longer than a year etc etc so who knows on that front. Obviously effective treatments are more promising for the short term but still there is nothing really insight just yet and IT will ‘go viral’ when it is effective stuff. So we are looking at a huge issue that is not even started in Nigeria, Egypt etc
Australia is currently just in front of Denmark ranked in Covid19 numbers @ 31 and even Ireland that is ranked 124 in population is worse than Australia! Clearly there will be millions of deaths unless there is a very unexpected early breakthrough. But people are quick to learn now and thankfully this is not going to be as bad as Spanish Flu was. Still all those higher population countries will sail past Australia as they have been doing.
I think for Australia it will soon be policy to ‘effectively protect the old, and let the young take their chances’ but that is a discussion for about 2 weeks time I suppose and that will be right in the middle of the Flu season! Good luck! We’re in the age group that will need it!
Sweden is well worth comparing to Norway and Denmark. The Swedish policies look a complete disaster at this stage. They lost another 170 people just last night (their worst day yet) and now stand @119 per mill. They have a population of 10 million and 1203 dead and 954 critical cases as at today even as the numbers from this first wave probably has begun to fall. A comparison to Australia would be 3,000 dead! They would have to have achieved massive heard immunity but it is still not even known to what extent protection on that front is even real. It is still only probable immunity and I have heard of no fatal cases of second time infection but the Koreans have reported on second time positive testing.
I think the policies will have to open up for the under 50ies in a couple of weeks at max with the social gatherings still under 10 or something realistic and protection of the ‘vulnerable’ being the focus. South Australia will be well placed for this at close to zero by then I would guess. BUT IT IS RIGHT IN FLU SEASON so this could go badly and they would have to turn on their heal and reverse setting if they could solve the 2-3 week lag problem. Quite the problem but it’s much better than living in Syria under Putin’s bombing!
Speaking of Taiwan – Bolt and his mate Rowan Dean going mental – https://www.skynews.com.au/details/_6149518385001
‘declares itself an independent country
‘An Ethiopian Marxist’ oh dear..live bat soup you can slurp up…
Taiwan is the worlds best model!
….
What is unbelievable is the idea of pulling the funds right in the middle of this! But Bolt has a point or 2…
https://www.skynews.com.au/details/_6149510233001
Just what is the goal now? From Scot Morrison just heard that no change for now and not for the next 4 weeks unless ‘we do even better’.
I think this can’t be the case in SA. Marshal ought to be saying perhaps 2 more weeks and then young people start and old stay etc.
I would expect good treatments to start to show up in about a months time and change everything but then I am by nature an optimist.
SA has 4 ICU 10 in Hospital and has only 433 recorded cases so in 2 weeks that is by may 1st it ought to be manageable with new ‘social distancing skills being the norm. Anyway just something for the record so that I can look back on these notes and get some sort of perspective on my thinking.
“IMV the reason Taiwan has dodged the bullet so well is because they do not have much to do with China….”
Are you aware that China is Taiwan’s biggest trading partner?
Taiwan did dodge a bullet because just before the pandemic China restricted Chinese visitors to Taiwan as a punishment, some punishment. Taiwan is a country in the group of countries who are recording the least number of cases, the article I linked to pointed out that countries with female leaders were doing well but my highlighting of this was somewhat tongue in cheek. I think that there are a variety of reasons why some countries do well and others not so well. Countries that had experienced SARS did well because they were prepared. Other countries did well because as the article points out they took effective measures and didn’t get caught up in machismo chest thumping about it being no worse than flu or that it would disappear by April or that it was a hoax.
Im not sure that it is correct to say that Taiwan knew early and said nothing because Taiwan says that they told the WHO in December https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/11395934/taiwan-coronavirus-warning-who-human-transmission-china/
I was just listening to the BBC show ‘Business Matters’
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/w172x18pdpz12rr from about 1:22 the explanation re Taiwan was very convincing.
1st point good intelligence;
2nd an epidemiologist and head of the SARS fight 2-IC plus a swag of medico’s right at the very top of the government;
3rd a very good and cheep medical system;
4th they were not members of the UN and so not following WHO at all; and
5th; the great luck factor that you mentioned of the mainland Chinese shutting down tourism from the previous September onward that was bad luck that turned out to be very good luck indeed!
Anyway have a listen and enjoy!
Re ‘others’ and just for the record;
I think the bigger picture is becoming clearer by the day even in among the general noise of what still appears a full blown world wide pandemic but it is also ‘seasonal’.
As for the actual current decisions to be made from that intersection of medical and economic problems; it’s not true that they are not able to be made by people other than by the Chief Medical Officers (CMO’s). People who ‘think they (the various Governments of Australia) are waiting to be told by the CMO’s when it is necessary to impose further restrictions.’ are just plainly wrong and I won’t even have to prove this as simply the next couple of weeks will take care of my assertion (or they won’t).
I say this current level of ‘lockdown’ is as bad as it will get in Australia and that is because the anti virus war we are in is being effectively fought with this current level of effort. The 1st wave is now clearly manageable and is being managed and active cases working their way down and out of existence.
Incidentally it may well be that the recovered patients are the gold mine for blood plasma and the all important antibodies for the treatments that the Japanese for example are now working so hard at…but I digress.
The virus now has to be thought of as endemic even in South Australia where it may well be temporarily wiped out very soon; say about 3 weeks time. Small scale community transmission has started in places as the second wave but this attack is finding the new ground very unfavorable because our society has changed for what is understood by only a few to be the ongoing fight against an endemic disease. This change of community behavior will continue to be the case in most crucial respects even as the worst aspects of the lockdown orders are unwound. The most important social distancing efforts will stay as the current culture just as other efforts ramp up in importance such as the tracing app tech. With exquisite ‘luck’ huge numbers of people will get far better at the barrier nursing procedures they are currently haphazardly learning just as they move through the ‘season’ of the second wave.
But another mid winter take-off of cases is more than just likely; I say it’s inevitable in some areas, but not across the continent and not all at once. When these outbreaks happen those places can then immediately replicate what we have just done nationally as a local lockdown as Tasmania has just demonstrated and will test.
The ‘search and destroy’ tasks are then the responsibility of specialist testing, isolation, medical and cleaning teams that will move from outbreak to outbreak. These teams have the job and will get better at it. Provided outbreaks get back to under a 1 for 1 rate the win is always about a month away. The Australian people are going to be on side for this protracted war and the more they get how this works they will remain so. I think they well understand that there must still be some deaths even with our very best efforts to fight in a way that makes some realistic sense. No doubt while the experts dither the masses will start to adopt masks gloves and sensible procedures in the riskier parts of the country etc
But good social distancing and constant surface cleaning of public touch surfaces etc have altered the risk factors in a massive way and so has the ‘shelter in place’ activities of the really vulnerable. We can also expect vast improvements in both tracing and testing as well.
On the down side I think that the number of really vulnerable people will however be far more in winter.
The statistical numbers are now big enough to conclude (from what were the earlier indications that were right across the statistics) that this virus does not like the heat and air conditioning is it’s friend. It has a bit of Goldilocks about it because the extreme cold is none too good for it either.
Nothing interesting about pretending there are not a range of options that people have to address. No point jabbering that right wingers prefer asset price management over avoidable deaths. Everyone is on a steep learning curve. It was not that long ago that the Grand Prix was going ahead in Victoria and only stopped at the very last minute! Then they tried to play AFL without the crowd! Andrews in Victoria for example is a walking disaster at the best of times and this period of time is definitely not the best.
But all the Australians are all not a patch on US born to rule governor Andrew Cuomo. If the Democrats don’t find a way of dumping Biden and running Cuomo then they deserve to lose to Trump. The Donald will now win or lose on what plays out with COVID19 and not much else. 6 months till the election and for my money it’s a toss of a coin at this point! However the people will learn quickly what to do the numbers will track down and the treatments will emerge so strap in for the ride. Who would be game to pick this race right now?
Back to the other virus, Australia, now at 40th on the most cases ranking (6,647 cases and @3per mil), looks very good in comparison to Belgium currently @518 deaths per million people, Spain @455, Italy @408, France @319, UK @243++ etc.
The big focus of the ABC is however on the US @137 and really New York at that (here is where the comparison ought to be to Madrid, or some other city) but the US state by state is worth watching https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/us/ When the real turn around comes in numbers in about 3-4 weeks time and Trump starts to point out that the US is looking good at ½ of France, Spain etc the Americans (in the right states) might just buy it.
I won’t defend the Premiers or Prime Minister as not one of our ‘leaders’ could even get control of toilet rolls so we can’t expect very much from them but they will not be marked down by most Australians who will just compare ‘their’ results to what is happening in other developed countries and as above that looks good.
Japan’s leaders even took actual time to understand and announce the Olympic Games were not going to be held in 2020! Nobody knows for sure about 2021, we ought to hope that effective treatments are rolled out and it could perhaps then be but you would have to be a very, very big optimist to put a bet on that one. Safe to say all crowd events will still not be a going concern for the next year till effective treatments are more than just sorted and really not till a vaccine is produced and there is no guarantee of that in 12-18months. So the worlds economy is utterly smashed; no back to normal after crossing a bridge!
Also we still know nothing about immunity from a second infection from those who are recovered (even if this does look very promising). So just like the flu this is very serious but we will have to live with a level of it for some time. Unlike the flu humanity will be fighting it a lot harder and there will be a well resourced and from the west at least full international effort.
We should all make our plans according to our risk factors because the lockdown will end sooner than some people think.
Meanwhile we are not even through April yet and with the music stopped internationally in the manner of a 1929 Wall Street Crash the scramble to see just who holds onto a chair is only just started for our generations great depression.
People are now paying others to take the oil that has to be stored and this shocks other people who are not in the industry so never thought about it!
We won’t know how many companies have really gone bust for months and then the sorting out will go on for years. And obviously the constant buy local ads on TV are about as ‘Smoot-Hawley-esk’ as you can get. Put’s Brexit in some sort of perspective but I don’t know what…
BUT people who think that medical workers are not making economic decisions every day, that are life and death issues are both child-like and rare. It’s far worse than silly if reds don’t admit that this will also be the case far into any future that the proletariat has any say in! Not everyone gets a transplant etc now and they won’t 100 years from now either; this is life and will continue to be the case for any of our children’s foreseeable futures. So cost / benefit analysis is always somewhere in the mix and there is nothing new with this problem applied to the 2019 virus that currently holds some people’s interest. Naturally the costs to who and the benefits to who are what is always to be teased out of this ‘we are all in this together’ mush that we are all deluged with but there always remains an economic dimension even if it’s a complex one.
Speaking of a sick analysis; Assad and his HIRISE life support team are still up against the Islamist and democratic Syrians now solidly backed by Erdogan and ‘mighty’ Russia and Iran are in even bigger messes for 2021 than I though for 2019.
We live now in interesting times, that is for sure!
I dont know where you get your information that Covid 19 is seasonal I guess the same place you got the idea that Taiwan doesnt have much to do with China.
There are 7 coronaviruses known to be contagious. Of these 4 are sharply seasonal but in a study by the University of Michigan School of Public Health it remains unclear if Covid 19 will join these.
“Even though the seasonal coronaviruses found in Michigan are related to SARS-CoV-2, we do not know whether that virus will behave like the seasonal coronaviruses,” said Arnold Monto, the Thomas Francis Collegiate Professor of Epidemiology at the U-M School of Public Health. “Only time will tell if SARS-CoV-2 will become a continuing presence in the respiratory infection landscape, continue with limited circulation as with MERS, or like SARS, disappear from humans altogether.”
I keep telling people again and again so I might as well tell you. There is no resemblance between what is happening now and what happened in the 30’s. After Wall St crashed then crashed again the governments of the world did everything wrong. They erected tariffs eg the notorious Smoot Hawley Act but Smoot and Hawley get too much of the blame. Governments even Roosevelt’s ran balanced budgets, clung to the gold standard, enforced the repayment of debt (see here the Premiers Plan) and the grand daddy of then all let Banks fail. Remember when Lehman Brothers fell over and Bush laughed saying well thats Capitalism, well no letting banks fall over is the end of Capitalism (as we know it)
Banks are central to every transaction if you dont have banks you dont have Capitalism
Well the usual objection by people who think that money represents value (like Marxists and Austrians)say if you start printing money ie the thing you have to do to keep the banks afloat you will stoke inflation. Well from the GFC do you see any inflation? (hint the Austrian economists do. I dont know about the Marxist economists I dont know any)
Heres the rub, depressions, what we face now are deflationary in nature not inflationary even if printing money sent inflation to 5% what would you rather have anarchy on the streets in a country like America where the population holds 400 million guns or non anarchy and 5% inflation.
Last word, money doesnt have to be backed by anything and its total doesnt have to equate with that countries goods and services money is credit a $10 note is good if you give it to me because I am confident that someone else will give me $10 worth of goods for that piece of polymer its good right up until as a society we wont honor it.
Patrick your posts are just confused you say that in South Australia the virus may be exterminated and then without drawing breath you say
“The virus now has to be thought of as endemic even in South Australia where it may well be temporarily wiped out very soon; say about 3 weeks time.”
Endemic means that it is always here, exterminated means that it has gone. The virus cant be both exterminated and endemic. It could be reintroduced but that is not endemic thats reintroduction.
Endemic definition of “In epidemiology, an infection is said to be endemic in a population when that infection is constantly maintained at a baseline level in a geographic area without external inputs. For example, chickenpox is endemic in the UK, but malaria is not.”
I forgot to post this so it’s out of sequence.
‘Are you aware that China is Taiwan’s biggest trading partner? Yes I am but trade is not the danger, infected people are. I was aware that they were not getting on well and with some people to people visiting problems because I had a Taiwanese man that I was taking home from work with my middle daughter on her L’s and he didn’t have any friends and would visit us as well; we had been talking about Hong Kong stuff etc (he has now been back home for some months before all this covid19 took off). But I have no deeper understanding.
‘Taiwan released the following email which it argues shows a warning about person-to-person transmission of coronavirus on December 31
“News resources today indicate that at least seven atypical pneumonia cases were reported in Wuhan, China.
“Their health authorities replied to the media that the cases were believed not to be SARS, however the samples are still under examination, and cases have been isolated for treatment.
“I would greatly appreciate if you have relevant information to share with us.
“Thank you very much in advance for your attention to this matter.”
So Steve you say; ‘I’m not sure that it is correct to say that Taiwan knew early and said nothing..’
A request for information from WHO on December 31 in this 1 email is not saying anything but it indicates what Taiwan authorities were looking at – for themselves.
And according to your source The Sun ‘Distrust of the Chinese regime however meant Taiwan was already screening arrivals from Wuhan as early as December 31.’ So they were just gathering more info while already taking strong measures that would only be taken if they were clear that something much bigger than ‘at least seven atypical pneumonia cases’ was underway. I think that it is only reasonable to conclude that to get this ball rolling this far this fast their intelligence services would have alerted the Taiwanese government! (Now given who we now know was 2IC etc from the above BBC show, I think it’s all pretty clear why they have done so well and will continue to do well.)
‘China restricted Chinese visitors to Taiwan as a punishment.’ I think you would agree that this info is significant and was probably all connected to the Hong Kong stuff as I had gleaned from my conversations. My general points are that the Chinese fascists are not the only people playing a purely nationalist hand. I will agree I don’t really know what the individuals are like if that helps you.
As for the virus stats; they are very interesting to the point that Austria currently @57 deaths per million people and Germany @61 are similar as is Denmark @64 but not Belgium @540 Spain @464 Italy @408 France @319. Cross the ditch and you run right into New York etc at the same latitude and the outcome is also predictable with latitude.
Consider the bottom US States like Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, California and compare to New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts there is a difference. Compare Queensland to Tasmania (and yes I understand it’s too small a sample but it is nevertheless consistent across the country. The hotter places seem to do better. Moist hot do best. Singapore is almost on the equator but it’s full of air conditioners. Air-conditioning makes everything the same!
Now look at the numbers for a 201 million population Nigeria currently @0.1 (782 cases/25deaths), 163mil Bangladesh @0.7 (3,372/120) , 109mil Ethiopia @0.03 (114/3), that is 473 million people involved 4,268 /148 dead. Panama however currently has 4,821 / 141. These rates are of interest to me anyway. I think there is a, albeit complex, smoking gun. Time will tell.
My bet is that despite the first wave shock where everyone is vulnerable, it will later be found to be seasonally affected in its transmission and lethality. All I am doing is looking at the stats as they continue to unfold and we now have a couple of months and a couple of disease cycles now to work with. In short I do not think that I am seeing a pattern where none exists. So I conclude the first few waves will have the pandemic characteristics and then eventually it will settle into endemic patterns; but either way this is one hell of a killer and I’m quite sure we all agree those treatments and the vaccine can’t come soon enough! All I can say is good luck to everyone in the ‘flu’ season but especially the vulnerable and the same people and over 65s in the non flu season.
I’m glad I’m in Adelaide but I would rather be in Cairns and I would stay away from air conditioned comfort! But hey very many very fit and otherwise apparently healthy individuals have succumbed especially while working under extreme pressure and in those air conditioned environments(not in OZ). I’m not the only one thinking along these seasonal type lines either! There are plenty of people saying this type of thing.
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/2020/04/worries-mount-that-southern-winter-may-tighten-coronavirus-grip/
Patrick your idea that there is a temperature correlation just doesnt align with the figures. If temperature was a main determining factor then neighboring countries would have similar results but in deaths per million France is 335 in Germany 67, USA 150 in Canada 57, Sweden 200 in Norway 36. So you see there is no temperature correlation. As the original article that I linked to pointed out the determining factor in high or low death rate is the action or inaction that the government took.
No and you obviously don’t even get what I am even talking about as your last 2 comments prove conclusively.
You said “The hotter places seem to do better.” My point is that South Korea is not hotter than Wuhan. Taiwan is not hotter than Wuhan. Norway is not hotter than Sweden. Germany is not hotter than France and Canada is not hotter than the USA.
Heres the difference if I want to understand seasonal effects on Covid-19 I look up studies like the study from the Michigan School of Public Health where as you just make stuff up.
“they do not have much to do with China”
“then proceeded to do bugger all to warn the rest of the world!”
“Australia, having been saved by the season”
“I would expect good treatments to start to show up in about a months time”
“The virus now has to be thought of as endemic even in South Australia where it may well be temporarily wiped out very soon”
This is just an example of what is interesting in the current stats.
Sweden has had 16,755 cases total & 550 have recovered that’s 1,659 per mil and with an horrendous @200 deaths per million far less than Belgium currently running @560
Austria has had 15,002 cases total BUT 11,694 have recovered 1666 cases per million and @58 deaths per million
So; from about the same amount of cases per million (Sweden has 10mil Austria about 9) well respected Sweden has about 4 times as many deaths and the recovery rate is worth watching as well!
Austria has done more than double the testing! I would guess that Sweden has the higher standard of living but I don’t know and there is probably not a lot in it but these are extraordinary differences between 2 highly industrialized countries in winter in Europe.
Well you can’t say that people haven’t tried with you Steve but once again we arrive at the water and it’s your horse-water-drink problems again. However thank you for proving my assertion that Taiwan did nothing to warn the world while it took action itself based on good intelligence. (The proof stares at you but if you stare blankly back at it I can’t be bothered explaining it again). Over time I am confident that you will also discover authorities who will prove to you that “The hotter places seem to do better.”. Indeed hot and moist best of all but not hot and moist and also air-conditioned as I have already indicated.
Your appeal to authority once more is noted and rejected! I will continue to back my observations and if you want to search around you will find similar authorities for my views. I will again leave it to time to show you up as unable to spot the relevant issue early.
Anyway Taiwan did so well because “they do not [currently] have much to do with China” And when they found out something big was up they “then proceeded to do bugger all to warn the rest of the world!” as now an undisputed point (among the sane people). Now because “Australia, having been saved by the season” because it was January and February and that is hot, we have done much better than all manner of people (some experts, some just well known commentators) have expected.
“I would expect good treatments to start to show up in about a months time” but then I am not at all surprised to find just a few hours later that the very first vaccine trials had begun! Quell surprise massive research is delivering results. Of course because our modern world is so intimately connected with rapid transport “The virus now has to be thought of as endemic even in South Australia where it may well be temporarily wiped out very soon”. I believe we currently have 36 active cases in the state with 4 in hospital 2 of them in the ICU fighting for life. Even while these known cases are resolving themselves if the state goes for 2 weeks without a new case that could probably be described as wiped out. But it’s only a matter of time before the next case springs up and I bet we don’t get through the flu season without seeing another local case. Naturally I would and do hope I’m wrong, but that is hardly the point.
So as usual you’re just confirming that you can’t read the work from people that you politically despise without gross and consistent failure to even grasp what they are saying; let alone learn anything from the work. When someone is as consistently unable to grasp even simple points (as you are demonstrating) at least 2 possible explanations and the combination of the 2 spring to my mind. You’re just plain thick as two planks or you’re wilful or thick and wilful as well!
Why you can’t understand that the Taiwanese government did nothing to warn the world about what it’s intelligence services were bound to have been picking up from it’s mortal enemy and that an email inquiring if there was any information is not a warning is beyond further discussion from me. Plainly ‘A request for information from WHO on December 31 in this 1 email is not saying anything but it indicates what Taiwan authorities were looking at – for themselves.
And according to your source The Sun ‘Distrust of the Chinese regime however meant Taiwan was already screening arrivals from Wuhan as early as December 31.’ So they were just gathering more info while already taking strong measures that would only be taken if they were clear that something much bigger than ‘at least seven atypical pneumonia cases’ was underway.’
The Taiwan people and the government fear and hate the mainland fascist regime that is known to the likes of Andrew Bolt as the communists. The Taiwan government knew that the fascists that run the mainland were lying about a big deal health issue that caused them to start screening on the same day as the email.
The ABC types strike me as people currently without consequence. If anything they are stacking away their pay while others go without! The whole world has been thrown into turmoil and not one of them has lost a dollar from their employment other than from their huge superannuation funds and their other private investments. The government ought to by now have announced widespread pay cuts right across the public service and required it immediately from all publicly funded institutions like the ABC but it has not as far as I know even raised the topic of spreading the pain around.
However such cuts will have to be made at some point as the country’s finances are currently in what looks to me like a free fall. Whatever magic pudding believers are sprouting, the real world accountants are all still at work and every day they are sorting out who is and isn’t solvent, and who now has to sell up at fire sale prices etc.
When your funds are guaranteed as they are in the ABC it’s all beer and skittles. The Sky News presenters are in a different position all together. As the advertising monies have dried up they have been faced with immediate consequences to their contracts. I think the differences are stark and quite telling in their different attitudes to such issues as unwinding the lock-down restrictions. The one set (the ABC) more risk averse for the ‘national health interest than the other lot.
This is massive economic bloodletting that has not been seen since the 1930ies and even then the world is so vastly different that apart from the lines of people looking to register for the dole there’s little else that is all that familiar at first glance.
But people always want to know just who owns what share of whatever it is. Shares in Virgin airlines for example are now worth…less than they were before! Boom Boom. The big sort out has begun and voluntary receivership of an airline is just a start. When Virgin are restructured and recapitalized I will bet they will have lost ⅓ to ½ their current labor force earnings! Everyone can see the basic outline that is coming out from this collapse!
More broadly with giant industries like overseas students and tourism smashed along with all manner of restaurants, pubs, clubs and service industries this is big change territory. True people won’t go hungry here in Australia but there are many parts of the world where the deaths that we have just seen visited on the western world will come to pass from just this unwinding of our global capitalism. Unable to pay for the medicines and so forth might take longer but the death toll from this economic crash are going to be more than just significant, they will be horrendous.
The media are just not picking up on the stats in the way that I look at this. They are not comparing the patterns that I am looking at. Nevertheless Oz and NZ are rather obviously now having to think of unwinding the lock-down and we are moving into full on flu season at the same time so we ought to keep our minds very open.
This is ridiculous you have asserted that “Taiwan did nothing to warn the world….” I countered this assertion with reference to Taiwan’s email dated Dec 31 to WHO where they point out that there is a new pneumonia in Wuhan and that affected people are being isolated ie because there must be human to human transmission. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-taiwan/taiwan-who-spar-again-over-coronavirus-information-sharing-idUSKCN21T0BA
On Jan 14 WHO hold press conference where they say that there is limited human to human transmission. On Jan 22 WHO issue statement that there is evidence of human to human transmission.
Your position is even more ridiculous when your statement “IMV the reason Taiwan has dodged a bullet so well is because they do not have much to do with China….” Up until Feb 2019 investments by Taiwan into China totaled US$183.4 Billion Cross-straight trade in 2018 amounted to US$150.5 billion. In 2018 travelers from China to Taiwan equaled 2.66 million mostly made up of tourists.
So where to from here? Well to obvious answer is you just acknowledge a mistake or you can make a long winded rebuttal that takes us on the usual Cook’s tour.
I just watched this https://www.skynews.com.au/details/_6151266037001 and it is almost exactly what I was saying above. It now appears that I am ‘channeling’ sky’s Bolt and Rowan Dean. Oh shit. If only they could pick up on the pseudo aspect! Ah well… But this is getting scary! Bolt and Dean are far to the left of the ABC climate alarmist loonies and now they are making sense over winding back covid restrictions. SA including Broken Hill should start the wind back in less than a weeks time and that ought to also be the case in much of the country areas of the rest of Australia. The shutdowns should now be very focused only. Where ever the cases really are! The whole of Queensland ought not be restricted if the active cases are only around Brisbane etc
Incessant jabbering about experts is typical and well explained by Bolt and Dean in the above clip.
Steve: The Hong Kong troubles led, as I said above, to bad blood between the fascists that run mainland China and the democrats that currently run Taiwan. I know very little about Taiwan just some pre-COVID19 conversations with a young man who was working at a chocolate factory who I would give a lift to etc as above. I got lucky as a result and somehow picked up that there was trouble between these governments that I knew to be mortal enemies. BUT the luck for the Taiwanese is quite evidently my luck to! The fact that they had little people movement at the time when it counted remains the case despite whatever was the case before the Hong Kong troubles altered that 2018 world. Just as they were lucky so am I. I would not be trying to work out why they had such a good outcome if they had not had such an outcome and they got that outcome because people movement had been very greatly disrupted for quite separate political reasons.
Whatever the trade and financial connections between the two countries the COVID19 outcome for 2020 was not just from the actions that the Taiwanese authorities started to take on 31st December 2019. But these intelligence services inspired 2-IC SARS Doctor etc (as per BBC report above) led actions were great! BUT they obviously did not warn anyone else!
They did send 1 email asking for more information about what is presented as a minor matter of some interest to them! That is all they did! Diplomats later tried to spin this but those are the only relevant issues.
You would not continually miss the big picture if you did not go out of your way to nit-pick rather than to make your small corrective contributions and focus on the main point. Some woman writer was reporting that female leaders were doing the response to covid19 better; turns out they aren’t. A point of small interest is that the female leader of Taiwan had almost nothing to do with this good result. But they were not just lucky either. They had good intelligence services telling them that something big was causing the centralized leadership of China to be issuing lots of orders.
They are wise to keep a well funded intelligence service focused on China.
You present the Bolt stuff as if is anything more than crass propaganda. In the talk with Roan Dean they agree that the Left want the police to go into peoples houses and whack them about the head in the interests of forcing the lefts global warming agenda onto people.
They say that scientific modelling is ludicrous.Dean says that the Liberals the Nationals and One Nation are in touch with the interests of working people.
Bolt states that Pelosi delayed the job saving package over “abortion and all that”. Turns out if you look at “all that” its $70 Billion for small banks, $75 Billion for hospitals and $25 Billion for COVID-19 testing.
Then they go onto icecream gate where she was exposed as an elitist. If you look at the James Corden interview she does 15 minutes about the US political situation and then at the end he asks her to show him something that is very Pelosi in the house and she opens her large expensive fridge and shows him icecream. Quick stop the press old lady likes icecream.
Now Bolt and Dean are nothing more than stooges in Murdoch’s quest to Fox News the world the problem is that after 40 years plus of studying politics you cant see this for what it is.
The 2 weeks I spoke about in the initial post above are now up! So time for the discussion that would be required about…now.
The following are really just my notes to self. The ABC types are obsessed with the US and Trump. For example they never mention Belgium. You would never know that Ireland is performing worse than Sweden per million and that is what counts. The US is doing better than a 330million core of Europe for another example and I would bet will end this the same way.
Back on ANZAC day -10 days on from the post- and the then current rates were; described as ‘now’. 4 days further on and I describe the new ones as ‘latest’.
The first point is that here in South Australia we have had a full week of no more cases!
Australia now@3.2 latest@3.6
New Zealand now@3.8 latest@4
Austria @59 latest@63
Switzerland @184 latest@196
Netherlands @250 latest@266
Luxembourg @136 latest@142
Denmark 5.7Mil @ 52 pe now @70 latest@75
Germany 83.5 @42 now @69 latest@75
Norway 5.4 @26 now @37 latest@38
Iceland 0.34 @23 now @29 latest@29
Finland 5.5 @12 now @32 latest@36
Estonia @35 latest@38
Latvia @0 latest@7
Lithuania @15 latest@16
Now consider Spain, Italy, France and the UK! Then finally the US.
Spain @397 now @482 latest@510
Italy @348 now @430 latest@453
France @241 now @341 latest@362
UK @178 now @287+ latest@319
Sweden @102 now @213 latest@233
Ireland now@205 latest@235
Portugal now @84 latest@93
Belgium currently now@576 latest@633
Andorra now@518* latest@531*
Canada @61 latest@76
U.S. @79 now@158 latest@179
California @20 now@41 latest@48
New York @552 now@1,085 latest@1,180
San Marino now@1,179* latest@1,208*
*nominal
Belgium currently running @633 deaths per million people!
In just 2 days (and then 2 more)
Nigeria currently @0.1 (782 cases/25deaths),
Now@0.2 (1,095/32) 1182/35 1,532/044
Bangladesh @0.7 (3,372/120) ,
Now@0.8 (4,689/131) 5416/145 6,463/155
Ethiopia @0.03 (114/3),
Now@0.03 (117/3) 123/3 126/003
That is 473 million people involved 4,268 /148 dead.
Now@ 5,901 /166 6,721/183 8,121/202
Panama (pop4.2) currently has 4,821 / 141.
Now@36 (5,338/154) 5,538/159 6,200/176
And I have just seen this https://www.skynews.com.au/details/_6150988888001
He is a useful authority https://medicalschool.anu.edu.au/people/academics/professor-peter-collignon-am
And this is spot on!! https://www.skynews.com.au/details/_6150985634001
Kenny is well worth listening to https://www.skynews.com.au/details/_6151234501001
He knows what Turnbull and the ABC are all about!
https://www.skynews.com.au/details/_6151234457001 I’m going to have to start regularly listening to him.
I note Paul Murray from Sky News would have been quickly corrected off air but I think it worth remarking that for some time this confusion that he suffered from was apparent in others ie he is no orphan and it ought to be cleared up. The ‘curve’ to flatten comes from the daily infections bar graph. That is the curve they were always talking about. It went up and down!
The total will never go down and can only go flat for a limited period and with the next case then resume the upwards movement that is it’s only possible direction. The curve ‘we’ had to flatten was never actually the total cases curve but the daily infection curve usually shown as a column graph behind the total cases line graph as they are constantly shown together and the total also started to flatten the confusion started to set in. People looked at the ALSO flattening total line graph and misunderstood the data that they were NOW observing and only recalled that we had to ‘flatten the curve’ and ‘we’ were doing that whatever you looked at..
Daily reported cases peaked on 28th March and have been falling predictably since. That was and is ‘the curve’ we are interested in most; it is the one that the authorities spoke of the urgent requirement to flatten.. This is the curve that interacts with capacity to manage the disease case load.
The other curves that ought to be prominent in peoples thinking are;
the recovery numbers that combined with death number and active cases = total cases. The Goal is zero active cases, so that recovered + the unfortunate deaths = total recorded cases.
the critical care numbers and
the hospital care numbers. The later 2 are currently in a steady decline with SA and NT most likely to be first to have zero in ICU then zero in hospital and then zero in active cases as we head into winter and prepare tracing for the second INEVITABLE wave. The government going for the phone app is very good https://www.skynews.com.au/details/_6150534313001 and https://7news.com.au/sunrise/on-the-show/coronavirus-australia-barnaby-joyce-refuses-to-download-contact-tracing-app-c-986069 ; it is also vital that everyone have this season’s flu vaccine. The developing social distancing skills and increased protection of the elderly are pretty powerful weapons against this enemy. That ‘tracking’ app could be a game changer.
Ramped up testing numbers (Latest is today’s news from Twiggy Forrest! That is good news. He just said without a vaccine testing is the only weapon that we have and that’s correct.)
I say ‘we’ above because this is a continent and several different issues are evident. The country is not important YET. The; States AND their regions are far more important so that unwinding the lock-down measures and discovering and isolating the NEW outbreaks can be managed sensibly. Singapore is for us the classic example of the second wave but it is a city state!
SA being the first to start to wind back out of lock-down mode is now self evident and is really underway.
[It looks like Steve is saying that thinking is bad; and anyway the ABC will find the experts to solve our problems]
https://www.skynews.com.au/details/_6152814733001
Is Bolt to the left of Steve Owens? At least he doesn’t worship experts!
Not sure what I think about his thinking but it’s more interesting than the Steve / ALP / ABC / Sco-Mo line. Swedish expert!
I think he is perfectly right about trust the people and don’t make too many laws and nor hand yet more powers to the police!
If there is a rapid development of an effective vaccine then his ‘yep’ in reply to ‘all ending up about the same’ would I think obviously not be the case.
Currently Oz is running from known cases at about 1.32% fatality (6738/89); Taiwan with 429 cases and 6 deaths have a 1.4% outcome from these recorded or reported cases and they would have to have been the bad ones to come to notice and they would have missed probably as many mild cases that were not recorded (but how can we know what that number is without discovering a trace from anti bodies with some kind of sampling); so if that were the case then from 860 actual cases that would be .7% or 7 times as bad as his estimate. The number would have to double that to 1720 then double again to about 3600 to get even near to his estimate. So his 0.1 fatality rate (seems like a large underestimate to me).
0.1% is 1:1000 if the entire population were infected and that would mean that Belgium @633per mil would be 63% infected already and that is unlikely and could be readily established. Belgium is one of the best candidates for finding out just how widespread the virus has got with the un-symptomatic and/or very mild version of Covid19 disease!
He is right in that the best return is washing hands and social distancing and trust the people; all very basic for reds!
But I’m not even very sure what protect the vulnerable actually consists of outside a quarantine regime.
Just constructed a spreadsheet for US states in order of deaths per million and it still looks to me like seasonal variation in the lethality of this virus is more than probable.
I was also struck today that reports of progress in treatments are now starting to be regular and realistic. Reports like ‘Remdesivir: Drug has ‘clear-cut’ power to fight coronavirus’
Zero cases continue in SA NT and WA and vast regions of other States as well so the unwinding of the over eager lock-down laws has also rightly begun.
One of the many Atlases I have is a nice child’s Atlas and it has 6x page maps for North America. 1 for Alaska/Canada, 1 for Mexico and the US has it’s 49 other states divided across 4 regional maps. Northeast, Southeast, Northwest and Southwest.
The Northeast has 19 states and DC.
Southeast 12 states
Northwest 8 states
Southwest 10 states includes Hawaii
Well what do the stats currently look like? https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/us/
When you sort by death per million of the worst 12 states 11 are in the Northeast!
The 5th worst in order is Louisiana and it had the unusual and massive international event of Mardi Gras as a good reason for it’s exception status!
There are a few other notable indicators that the virus is particularly vicious in it’s Goldilocks climate or season zone and not just the same effect right across the world.
As for the MSM and the local ‘authorities’ I have to say that people who get virtually everything wrong are not likely to be getting this pandemic ‘right’. Climate alarmists are alarmist types just for starters. The Victorian Premier is Dan ‘I’m as stupid as a meat-axe’ Andrews. He still believes Cardinal Pell is a child rapist! Just try to get one of these ABC type people to say I got it completely wrong about Pell. It just does not happen! They keep churning out utter bullshit. Plastic shopping bags; container deposit legislation; the liberation of the Iraqi people from the fascists; war on waste; GM foods; bike helmet crap; on and on they go with their utter trash. They haven’t got a clue about democracy or imperialism or capitalism or even Captain bloody Cook!
So Steve given that solid materialist thinkers with a working class world view are always in short supply, if it’s all the same to you, I think I’ll just keep thinking and quite frankly slowly putting even more runs on the board. People don’t get very far sitting on fences or marching off facing the wrong way.
Happy May Day! Down with Andrews and the ALP!
You may be correct with your map of the US but I think that there are so many more variables than latitude. Just compare NYC to Miami both places were of concern when this virus hit. NYC is an international transit hub with both JFK and Laguardia. When Trump introduced the European travel ban US citizens flooded back. Many would have been contaminated and many would have put down in NYC. Then theres personal transport Ive never been to either city but it seems that Floridians drive about in cars more while NYC is well known for its crowded public transportation system.
I have a friend in NYC he got the virus he says it was hell and he had to manage his isolation in a one bedroom apartment trying to distance himself from his partner. He thinks that he was lucky a couple of his friends died from this.
Part of viruses being seasonal is about our behaviour. Its harder to infect another in weather that encourages outdoor living than it is in weather where we huddle together for warmth.
Yeah I love it when the Sky news stooges those who peddle constant outrage and who like the flat earth approach of Malcolm (Im in touch with working people) Roberts while people they loath you know Angela (I take advice of Experts) Merkel https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-05-03/coronavirus-angela-merkels-science-background-gives-her-an-edge/12200494
What? Are praised by the ABC?
You must think you have some kind of point, perhaps you could read your 3 lines of bile about Sky and work out what it really is.
While you are at it, you might like to nominate 1 person from the ABC types who have stood against the tide of the Pell witch hunt and got the fact that he was 100% innocent of the insane set of charges that were ridiculously leveled against him and what is to be done about Dan ‘I’m as thick as a brick’ Andrews getting in the way of an inquiry into this world class scandal!
Before you tell me how good mother Merkel is (after all it was some months ago now that we who were thinking knew what getting the exponential growth to under 1:1 would mean)so that is hardly of interest,
or that
‘There is no one answer for why Germany has been able to slow the rate of infection. Mr Sparrow believes luck, leadership and Germany’s reliance on expertise are all factors. However, he points out that while there have been successes, thousands of people have still died since the beginning of the year. “There is a particular concern about the general number of deaths even though it’s less than other parts of Europe,” Mr Sparrow said.’
perhaps you would like to explain the difference between France and Germany and then Denmark’s almost identical result to Germany. And why is Austria doing so much better? The Austrian leaders?
Or you can wait for the ABC/BBC global warming alarmists to tell you what to think. Ditto for Turkey, Syria, Iraq and on through the swamp. You can thank them for shopping bag laws and Bike helmet idiocy, drink container legislation Murry river nonsense and the de-sal plants… as a matter of fact big issues or small why you find the always wrong a comfort is beyond me.
More freedom please! De-fund the ABC!
Bile against Murdoch’s media? Why would anyone have bile against the media organisation that ran the public campaign against Lindy Chamberlain? Why would anyone have bile against the media organisation who while running a campaign to support the McCann’s publishes unauthorised extracts from the mothers diary. Why would anyone have bile for a media organisation that hacks the voice mail of Milly Dowler.
Murdoch has an international media empire that aims at moving the political dial to the far right. Do I have bile well I dont think that bile is a strong enough word. Remember “Gotcha” The Murdoch media empire is a threat to democracy part of which is a relentless campaign to have public broadcasters run out of town so I guess we can have less investigative journalism and more page 3 girls.
Your bile against Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews is having great effect I see that he can only muster an approval rating of 75% looks like its toiletville for him.
https://www.afr.com/politics/federal/does-daniel-andrews-deserve-his-record-popularity-20200428-p54nw6
Yep it was the subway wot did it
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/new-york-cutback-on-subway-trains-helped-spread-coronavirus-mit-study
https://www.skynews.com.au/details/_6158216947001 Bolt is essential to this debate.
Patrick are there 2 people writing your entries because one said in reference to Taiwan “…only one step down in culpability from the rats of the Chinese fascists and the rats in WHO!” and now the other one is channeling Andrew Bolt in his proclamation that Taiwan is the model.
You really need to take your argument over to C21st left where eradication is the gold standard and Daniel Andrews is a national hero.
Why do you think this thread was started April 15?
And then why do you think it was added to as developments have come to pass? It’s only May 24!
A COVID ’success story’ has emerged which goes against ‘the harsh shutdown rhetoric’ Is that right or not? Is it at least arguable?
What do you say about Papua, Timor Lest, New Caledonia, Faeroe Islands, Falkland Islands, French Polynesia? Reunion? Vietnam, Rwanda? Hawaii, Texas, Florida? Is there nothing interesting happening right in front of your eyes? What is going on with Singapore? Qatar, Bahrain? I happen to think that there is much to puzzle about.
But people that are getting everything wrong are not likely to start getting it all right. Andrews is a total disaster and I think proof of this will now steadily unfold over the rest of 2020!
Now just because the Taiwan government failed to warn others is no comment on what they did for their own peoples protection now is it? But you know that.
Experts have not had a very good record with this pandemic.
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/ and my understanding from a month ago is standing up well.
Belgium is now 797 deaths per mill and heading for 1,000 and the woman that is leading that country has little public support. The turning of the backs was great stuff that is the way to demonstrate.
I have not bothered to raise Brexit nor Erdogan’s importance nor the criminal conduct of the PKK leadership as they played with Assad nor border control issues the list goes on…
I have no wish to disturb a fantasy land with unwanted views of how the world works.
Look I can find posts of mine in March that argued that the Australian government was doing to little too late, that if it had taken early action we could have remained at near zero cases and I highlighted countries like Taiwan or towns like Vo who had been doing all the right things. You come along mid April with your ill informed rant against Taiwan. Now your pin up boy Andrew Bolt at this late stage wants to emulate Taiwan only so that businesses can prioritise profits over people. Well sorry bud but I still hold to the slogan people before profits. The economy has had a 2 month holiday and if we have to have 2 months more so be it. Say no to the death cult say fuck off Wall Street Journal and to Andrew Bolt and Rupert Murdoch who owns them both.
This should settle what Taiwan’s role was
https://time.com/5826025/taiwan-who-trump-coronavirus-covid19/
Why?
Are you by some curious means now accepting that I was probably correct that their intelligence services picked up early that there was an issue and that the mainland government were issuing orders that brought on Taiwan’s own precautionary testing of people the same day that they made a very casual inquiry if WHO knew anything that might help Taiwan? Or are you saying it was just Social media that they probably noticed!
They did know enough to send in their own investigator with 1 from HK and another from Macau a couple of weeks later what a co-incidence, and even then they still had not warned the world even though they were testing people for temperature from the very same 31st December as they sent their own casual inquiry about some half dozen a-typical pneumonia cases.
Anyway don’t worry Steve after this little scare they probably will set up an intelligence network and take an interest in what the Chinese fascists are issuing orders about!
Now what do you say ‘Taiwan’s role was’?
Dec 31 social media reports in China that there is respiratory infections in Wuhan.
Dec 31 Taiwan asks WHO and Chinese government about these social media reports
Dec 31 Wuhan health authorities announce 27 cases
Dec 31 Foreign minister Wu states that they are not getting satisfactory answers from WHO or China
Dec 31 Taiwan institute screening
Jan 13 Taiwan sends medical investigation to Wuhan and shares its findings with other like minded countries.
Tedros from WHO states that Taiwan was not the first to raise questions about infections in Wuhan
So there you go no one is talking about the Taiwanese intelligence service except you. No one is claiming that Taiwan with held information except you.
You truly are as thick as…
That is a very busy last day of the year now isn’t it.
‘Dec 31 Foreign minister Wu states that they are not getting satisfactory answers from WHO or China’ must have been marked urgent and CC’d to the fascists leaders!
They were already taking the action to screen on the 31st so they were not just thinking about issues they knew what was going on already.
They do not claim to have any ‘spies’ on the mainland telling them that all manner of orders are being issued by the central leadership but even dolts like your old Trot mates would think it very strange if they did not have such people placed to try to know what orders were being made about oh I don’t know stuff…
Glad you think they warned the world by asking for info for themselves no doubt. Even in the article you draw attention to implication is quite clear. I can’t help it if you are unable to read. They are not going to talk any more clearly about such matters now are they!
So Taiwan has spies in China and instead of watching the military or industry or the CCP you think that Taiwanese spies are watching hospitals in Wuhan? and when these hospital spies conclude what anyone monitoring social media can pick up Taiwan asks China and the WHO to explain what is happening. Have you seen Sasha Barren Cohen’s recent movie The Spy its very good but the spy doesnt hang around hospitals looking for someone coughing.
So Taiwan has spies in China and…’their intelligence services are obviously very focused on it and good enough to pick up on this type of issue. They learned early that the Chinese government were frantically dealing with an out of control virus AND that they were contemptibly not saying much publicly about it!’
You know the Chinese fascists were issuing orders to silence people about what was going on.
Nothing more from you on this thanks as I am not interested in you displaying your idiocy any further!
It’s the first day of summer and it’s clear to me that the covid threat in Australia is (essentially) over. Death rates from this virus will probably now be similar in numbers to the annual (average) flu death rate. Covid turned out to be seasonal and so Victoria was always a greater risk but it also was the case that Dan Andrews as I predicted in May 2020 was on top of that, a disaster just waiting to happen! Now with vaccines and treetments, we are at the end of the epidemic and Victoria has produced over 2/3rds of the deaths in Oz!