CoronaVirus ==> Empty Shelves

[GraemeCook]

.....
I still shaking my head about the hairdressers. ! In this case I know it's not Peter Dutton pushing it.

mick

Who would be stupid enough to go to a hairdresser??? Perhaps they may forfeit their place in the gene pool?

[Tccp123]

Who would be stupid enough to go to a hairdresser??? Perhaps they may forfeit their place in the gene pool?

You might be on shaky ground... )

[GraemeCook]

Just watching Melatonia bragging about how well everything is going, and the great G20 meeting. Looking forward journalists' questions to him on having now the world's highest number of cases at 81,000+

Coronavirus Live Updates: U.S. Now Has More Known Cases Than Any Other Country - The New York Times

Didn't see Melanoma, just the FWIC on the same topic.

You missed the obvious headline!

[doug3030]

Who would be stupid enough to go to a hairdresser??? Perhaps they may forfeit their place in the gene pool?

Here's a couple:

Today I was second in the line at the fruit and vege shop, and because I take it seriously because of my medical conditions I was standing right at the end of the checkout while the person being served was down the other end near the cashier, over a metre of "social distancing". A woman joined the queue behind me and stood so close I could feel her breath on my arm.

I politely said to her "Excuse me but do you really think it is advisable to stand that close together?"

She snapped back "Well if you Fu*k!ng moved up the counter I could put my stuff on it."

Me: "Are you aware that we are supposed to be practicing social distancing?"

Her: "Do you think I am a ***king leper or something?

Me: "No not at all, it's just what the Government is recommending because of he pandemic."

Her: "Don't give me that %h!t, I'm not a f**&ing idiot."

Somehow I kept my cool and paid for my shopping and left while she continued to cast aspersions on my parentage to anyone who would listen.

Idiot #2 for the day:

Jools came home on the train and walked from the station to Woolies. I parked in the car park out the front to wait for her. Just sitting in the car listening to the radio with the window down. Next thing I know there is a head in the car with me, intruding through the window, asking me if I want to buy a raffle ticket. I just turned the ignition key to on and hit the window up button and the head magically withdrew from the car's interior. The head then started streaming profanities at me through the glass, but I just picked up the phone and started up the camera. Unfortunately once the phone came out the head disappeared before I could actually start recording. Social distancing and Covid-19 aside that was too intrusive any day of the week. What the hell are people thinking?

I had to stop as pedestrian lights in Essendon while I was driving on Friday. A woman crossed the road in front of me wearing a mask tied over her face. When she was walking directly in front of my car I noticed that I could see right through the mask from one side to the other. It was touching above her nose and under her chin but the sides were right away from her face. Not sure what it was achieving.

I can give more examples if you like.

[GraemeCook]

Looks positive but the Italian Authorities are still concerned the general population will slacken off their vigilance as they will need to keep this up for some time. This is the time that's the hardest to cope with as coming off the brake too early could easily result in a rebound. The will also be a subsequent waves to contend with.

The Italians imposed a full lock down in their most affected regions some 4 weeks ago when they about 1/4 of the cases and the same number of deaths Australia has now. The Italian data suggests it takes 4 weeks to see a significant change in the curve so we should have been at full lock down at least one week ago.
....

So true, Bob.

Researchers in the COVID-19 Response Team at Imperial College, London looked at this issue and included it in their paper published on 16 March 2020. From their modelling, they concluded that if the suppression measures are stopped too early then the virus may rebound and be worse than no action at all.
https://www.imperial.ac.uk/media/imp...16-03-2020.pdf

Modelling - Imperial College.jpg

[BobL]

Just saw another ordinary performance from the PM and then switched over to watch US ABC news - he really needs to see more of this sort of thing.

I understand he wants to keep as many people at work as possible. However, unless we're talking about DT how can any leader look a shoe sales assistant, schoolteacher's, or hair dresser's family in they eye 6 weeks from now and say "the death of your family member doesn't count, I kept you working" ?

If we ask any unnecessary worker today if they would sacrifice their unnecessary job for the life of a family member or friend then I think we'd know most of their answers.

[Tccp123]

If we ask any unnecessary worker today if they would sacrifice their unnecessary job for the life of a family member or friend then I think we'd know most of their answers.

But of course we don't ask that question. There's no doubt that decisions that involve balancing lives and costs are far easier to take when the life at issue is not likely to be your own. It is one thing to think in terms of trade-offs when those who will be affected are anonymous draws from a large population and quite another when it is a matter of family and friends.

[DomAU]

But of course we don't ask that question. There's no doubt that decisions that involve balancing lives and costs are far easier to take when the life at issue is not likely to be your own. It is one thing to think in terms of trade-offs when those who will be affected are anonymous draws from a large population and quite another when it is a matter of family and friends.

And yet, we make those trade-offs all the time, every day, with many decisions we make. We take risks with our lives all the time, be it to save time, make money, get some sort of enjoyment etc. For some reason a virus is far more scary though for most people - myself included. Rationally, I know that riding 90km to work and home most days on 100kph single lane roads with no shoulder, in rain, fog, dark etc is far far more likely to kill me than this virus - yet it doesn't stop me doing it.

[Tccp123]

And yet, we make those trade-offs all the time, every day, with many decisions we make. We take risks with our lives all the time, be it to save time, make money, get some sort of enjoyment etc. For some reason a virus is far more scary though for most people - myself included. Rationally, I know that riding 90km to work and home most days on 100kph single lane roads with no shoulder, in rain, fog, dark etc is far far more likely to kill me than this virus - yet it doesn't stop me doing it.

You've hit the nail on the head!

[DomAU]

But of course we don't ask that question. There's no doubt that decisions that involve balancing lives and costs are far easier to take when the life at issue is not likely to be your own. It is one thing to think in terms of trade-offs when those who will be affected are anonymous draws from a large population and quite another when it is a matter of family and friends.

Also, if the government wasn't handing out other people's money left and right, I wonder how many of us would be happy to give up our source of any income to mitigate this risk - really, think about it, imagine no safety-net at all, would you be happy to quit and not get any income at all for as long as it might take to completely stop the spread? I don't know the answer - but the question is definitely there - as are the impacts on a national / global level.

[BobL]

And yet, we make those trade-offs all the time, every day, with many decisions we make. We take risks with our lives all the time, be it to save time, make money, get some sort of enjoyment etc. For some reason a virus is far more scary though for most people - myself included. Rationally, I know that riding 90km to work and home most days on 100kph single lane roads with no shoulder, in rain, fog, dark etc is far far more likely to kill me than this virus - yet it doesn't stop me doing it.

Humm . . . . I understand what you are driving at BUT there are significant differences.
You riding your bike on a dangerous road is personal. Your death is unlikely to cause someone else to lose their life.
The moron drink driver is more applicable but even then they might take no more than a handful of people.
Carrying on an unnecessary job and not staying home is, in the current climate, much more likely to result in many more people dying.

Comparisons with motor vehicles are complicated, considerable economic and benefit comes about from using motor vehicles including saving many lives, fighting fires etc.

What does COVID give us?

COVID is more like the a war than motor vehicles.

When the bombs were falling everyone except the absolutely necessary workers like ackack gunners, wardens, and police headed for the air raid shelters. Do we think the Spaniards or Italians are today sitting around worrying about making sure everyone has an unnecessary job? By the time we have a few hundred deaths it may be too late to turn the ship around.

When the enemy artillery are decimating our troops at the front we don't return fire with every second of our smaller guns and make sure everyone has an unnecessary job - we give em back everything we've got.

It would be a different thing if those in unnecessary employment were set to work in more useful employment.

[NeilS]

latest estimates are that more than half of the most populous nation [ie Indonesia] per square km on earth are infected, about 150 million people.

Latest estimates by whom?

[Beardy]

I don’t know anything about the panel of medical experts that are advising our government but assume by some comments here and elsewhere that some think they don’t know what they are talking about?

[Bushmiller]

I don’t know anything about the panel of medical experts that are advising our government but assume by some comments here and elsewhere that some think they don’t know what they are talking about?

I don't really question the advice that is given. I question whether the actions taken by the government truly reflect the original advice that is given. My take is that the version we are fed is much modified at best and cherry picked at worst.

Regards
Paul

[Tccp123]

I don’t know anything about the panel of medical experts that are advising our government but assume by some comments here and elsewhere that some think they don’t know what they are talking about?

I don't think it's so much that, it's more when someone says "A panel of experts said..." or "Recent studies have shown..." it ain't necessarily so.