tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4905080602885676490.post2697942993658872741..comments2024-03-27T20:34:09.464+01:00Comments on zmkc: Lizards in Lockdownzmkchttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08972549292961948240noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4905080602885676490.post-27950570843584899912021-02-01T09:30:37.787+01:002021-02-01T09:30:37.787+01:00I think only Australia & NZ could have done wh...I think only Australia & NZ could have done what they have done & I'm not convinced it will be worth it, particularly as the government has not ensured vaccine rollout is rapid. Victoria ought never to have ended up in the situation it did. That was immensely costly socially and financially and caused entirely by governmental mismanagement. But I sense, from the aggression directed toward the journalist Rachel Baxendale when she tried to do the absolutely central job of a journalist - ask questions - that Victorians are in no mood to see their leader's feet of clay. You were forced to be locked up caring citizens unnecessarily long because of government stuff up and I cannot imagine the loneliness or the strain on families in small flats.<br />In Britain now 25 per cent of COVID infections (including the famous 100-year-old, Captain Tom) are picked up inside hospitals. <br />I think we must all hope for the very best as we have done something terrible, acting from blind panic. The full scope of our blunder will emerge over the coming years.zmkchttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08972549292961948240noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4905080602885676490.post-76183391124744232552021-02-01T08:04:41.453+01:002021-02-01T08:04:41.453+01:00Ok. I'm really glad that I live in Melbourne w...Ok. I'm really glad that I live in Melbourne where we didn't behave like naughty children. We behaved like caring citizens and we now get to reap the benefits and go about our lives with very few restrictions or worries. It's marvellous. I can't see it happening elsewhere now (other than NZ) because contact tracing is simply not possible when you have over, let's say, 50 new cases a day. So I guess I can see why people like Elsa just go ahead and do as they please...the virus has basically over there, for now anyway. <br />The death rate per million in Brazil is 1,052. In Australia it is 35. In the UK it is 1,559. In NZ it is 5. Having made big sacrifices in Melbourne to reach zero new cases per day, I'm satisfied with how the winter lockdown in VIC has turned out for us (and our health care workers particular).<br />As for wrecking the lives of the young, climate change is doing a damn good job of that anyway. <br />But everyone is entitled to their opinions and I totally agree with some of your points re the UK government for sure. What a monumental stuff up. <br />Cheers. Hoping for the very best for you in the Uk and Europe. Annenoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4905080602885676490.post-4827770378175514202021-02-01T06:47:35.619+01:002021-02-01T06:47:35.619+01:00We have wrecked the lives of the young because we ...We have wrecked the lives of the young because we thought the coronavirus had the death rate of the Spanish Flu. It doesn't - Belgium has the highest death rate per million of any country and even there the figure is 1,827 - Sweden where rights have not been stripped from people with national lockdowns and Brazil, where the government is mad and doesn't care what the media or anyone says and the disease has run rampant, have much lower death rates per million. Lockdowns have the great advantage for politicians that if they appear to work they can be declared a success and if they don't that proves that they need to be extended and made tougher and the people who break them are to blame.<br />zmkchttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08972549292961948240noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4905080602885676490.post-62728283268992367262021-02-01T06:01:58.703+01:002021-02-01T06:01:58.703+01:00I think they've been messing with your mind, A...I think they've been messing with your mind, Anne. If you don't respect people, but instead treat them like naughty children, they will behave like naughty children. But I imagine the ABC is broadcasting the BBC's footage to you, and on the BBC we see a nightly attempt to whip up panic. Apart from the fact that what their reporters are doing often amounts to the most extraordinary invasion of patients' privacy at a time when the last thing anyone needs is a camera crew on top of everything else, if the BBC were doing its job properly it would be emphasising the known fact - clearly visible in their footage too - that overweight is one of the major vulnerabilities, instead of presenting interviews with obviously fat people who had a bad bout and escaped death and describing them as having no underlying vulnerabilities. If the BBC wanted to be truly of service, they would be spending the energy they waste on reports that are not fit for tabloid newspapers in their ghoulish chasing after tears and pain, but instead making it clear that there is an obesity emergency and showing people how to escape their own fatness. As to the government, like all major governments it failed at the task of protecting the vulnerable and has now cheerfully wrecked the economy and everyone's lives for no clear gain - last time I looked the death rate per 1000 in the UK was higher than in Sweden, where no blanket lockdown has ever been introduced. The truth is that Britain went into the pandemic with fewer beds per thousand of population than other comparable countries. It has more of the most densely populated cities than other countries in Europe and, indeed, the south east of England is the most densely populated place in Europe. Viral spread in these circumstances was never avoidable - and even in Australia, particularly Victoria, after the deaths of the South Australian newborns, I am concerned that our priorities in desperately focussing on avoiding deaths from one particular pathogen at the expense of everything else have turned us into something less than human. Although the government in the UK spent ten billion pounds of taxpayers' money on a track and trace system, it did not work. It also spent a great deal building much trumpeted Nightingale Hospitals; tens of thousands retired doctors and nurses volunteered to staff them and not one was contacted and put to work. The UK government now says that, even when the population has been vaccinated, they will not be lifting restrictions until autumn - what trust could anyone have in them? Their only tool apparently is to shout at the population. Yes,the virus is highly infectious and deadly in some cases. Informing citizens of the dangers, explaining that there will be unavoidable deaths but the government with the help of the people will do everything it can to avoid those, taking all measures to protect the vulnerable, should have been the approach. As I said before but it bears repeating - treating people like naughty children turns them into naughty children. The UK government doesn't govern, it lurches, driven by whatever is the latest media howl. I should add that central to all this is a refusal to understand that death stalks us constantly, unfortunately, terrifyingly, but it is a fact of life - and our reactions to the situation are, I think, influenced by how much we understand that, unpalatable as it is. <br />Leaving all that aside, nothing Elsa and Xan did had the slightest chance of triggering the spread of the virus. They went into a man's house, then they went home. The way governments have stripped away people's rights, largely to try to compensate for their own incompetence, is the thing that shocks and frightens me. But I guess you are one of those who 'stand with Dan'. zmkchttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08972549292961948240noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4905080602885676490.post-61247000615328181842021-02-01T00:00:10.551+01:002021-02-01T00:00:10.551+01:00In my opinion, as an Aussie in Melbourne where the...In my opinion, as an Aussie in Melbourne where there have been zero community transmissions for 23 days, Elsa and Xan are both insane and morally corrupt. If people continue to flaunt the rules comme ca, Uk will never get control of this virus and nurses in the NHS will be continually faced with trauma and death that could have been avoided. I feel so sorry for those nurses and doctors. How they continue to front up each day to confront the suffering that they see, while also putting themselves at grave risk of contracting COVID themselves, is amazing. Sorry Elsa and Xan, but staying at home a few more months til vaccination finally makes some headway is a sacrifice well worth making.Annenoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4905080602885676490.post-63983612962985241452021-01-31T23:55:35.679+01:002021-01-31T23:55:35.679+01:00Wow!Wow!Nigehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13314891387515045404noreply@blogger.com