Monday 10 May 2021

Not Quite the Washup

Pic courtesy healthychildren.org

Let's look at the pandemic fourteen months in. 

 I consider it fourteen months, because my nephew's wedding was fourteen months ago, and it was one of the last weddings held before the local restrictions arrived. 

On a personal note, my family, with the exception of our youngest daughter weathered it without too many hassles. It completely ruined her great adventure, although she was able to do the UK festival circuit and visit Portugal and Iceland before she was anchored by the lockdown. 

 Because my bride and I are both retired, it didn’t affect our work lives, but it stymied some travel plans, including a fifty-year reunion and commemoration organised by my old unit. As a consequence of that, and another canceled trip, I have what one of the airlines calls a “travel wallet”. The trouble is that the wallet is in their pocket, and not mine. 

 More broadly, I have become very familiar with Zoom and was using it twice weekly for gym and my old geezers’ meetings. We’re back to the gym in person now, and our early morning chats over coffee have reverted to the face-to-face format, although we had to wear masks during the most recent Queensland short and sharp lockdown. 

After watching what schools were going through, I'm very glad I'm no longer a school principal. They were caught between the demands of their school communities and the restrictions imposed by the Health and Education bureaucracies. 

 It’s amazing how quickly we have become accustomed to signing into venues, and to doing the hand sanitising thing. The emphasis on hygiene must be working. Nobody in the family has had so much as a cough or sniffle since 2019. 

I kid you not. 

 The other unexpected bonus was my Astra-Zeneca vaccination a few weeks ago. There were absolutely no side effects, and my routine morning backache has disappeared since. It’s probably a coincidence, but I’ll take it. 

Another bonus is the rapid rise in the value of my classic car. Apparently, because punters can no longer travel, they're spending their dosh on cars and home renovations.

 The national and international outcomes have not been so benign. The tragic statistics in Italy, France, and the UK have been overshadowed by chaos in the USA, Brazil, and now India. On the other hand, the most populous country in the world seems to have come out of it better than most. 

Our governments, both state and federal have made a pretty good job of managing outbreaks, despite obvious weaknesses in our hotel quarantine system. Howard Springs works, and I don't understand why more remote locations close to airports aren't utilised. 

There seems to be an inverse correlation between the pandemic being used as a political wedge, and the health of the population. The statistics in the USA and Brazil bear this out. 

 Leadership has also played a part. Populists (Trump, Bolsonaro, and Modi) who put their political profile before the health of their populations have visited a dreadful result on their people. One of them (Trump) has paid the political price, and it looks as if Bolsonaro is heading down that same track. It’s too early to tell whether Modi will lose his gloss. 

 One thing is certain. The virus has changed everything. We now have a Coalition government happy to borrow extensively, despite the fact that when Labor did the same during the GFC it became a “debt and deficit disaster”. 

 Who would have thunk it?

As observed earlier, the virus is an asteroid.

Comments closed.

29 comments:

Anonymous said...

Trump didn't lose the election because of his handling of the Wuhan Flu.
Firstly, he made a lot of good decisions. Stopping travel from China and sending hospital ships to hot spots are just two of them.
He also is credited with the rapid introduction of vaccines.
He lost the election because of fraudulent handling of votes by democrats.
John Grey.

1735099 said...

Trump didn't lose the election because of his handling of the Wuhan Flu.

His mishandling of the pandemic is just one of the many reasons Americans preferred Biden. Having said that, to misquote Bill Hayden, a drover's dog would have beaten Trump. Voters were well and truly over him and his bloated ego and non-stop lies.

He also is credited with the rapid introduction of vaccines..
He spent a fortune acquiring stocks of the vaccines but had no plan to distribute them. The Biden administration has been very successful in doing that.

He lost the election because of fraudulent handling of votes by democrats.
He lost the election because he won 232 electoral college votes wheras Biden scored 306.

From Wikipedia -
"The 2020 United States presidential election was the 59th quadrennial presidential election, held on Tuesday, November 3, 2020. The Democratic ticket of former vice president Joe Biden and the junior U.S. senator from California Kamala Harris defeated the incumbent Republican president Donald Trump and vice president Mike Pence. Trump became the first U.S. president since George H. W. Bush in the 1992 presidential election and the eleventh incumbent president in the country's history to lose a bid for a second term. Biden's 51.3% of the popular vote was also the largest percentage of the popular vote won by any challenger to an incumbent president since the 1932 presidential election. The election saw the highest voter turnout by percentage since 1900, with each of the two main tickets receiving more than 74 million votes, surpassing Barack Obama's record of 69.5 million votes from 2008. Biden received more than 81 million votes, the most votes ever cast for a candidate in a U.S. presidential election.

Anonymous said...

You are seriously believing that Biden was more popular than Obama?
Wrong, wrong, and wrong.
The 3am vote dumps, the massive fraud of mail in ballots, and the lack of voter ID gave Biden the win.
John Grey

Anonymous said...

"I consider it fourteen months"
Meanwhile, the rest of world's population consider it to be at least 16 months because December 2020 saw the first identified cases, the first international alert, and the first public message.
Still out of step eh Private?
John Grey

Anonymous said...

Why wear a mask Bob when they have been found to be totally ineffective?
Oh I know - you were conscripted into wearing it. That makes it OK.
John Grey

Anonymous said...

"The virus has changed everything."
No.
Government reactions to the virus changed everything.
Lockdowns, face masks, the banning of travel, American state Governors moving sick people into old age homes - all these are government decisions. The virus could have been treated in many different ways, including the use of ivermectin and Dettol.
"Specific Dettol products have demonstrated effectiveness (>99.9% inactivation) against coronavirus strains from the same family as the 2019 Novel Coronavirus (COVID-19) in third party laboratory testing when used in accordance with the directions for use."

https://thelogicalindian.com/fact-check/dettol-covid-19-coronavirus-outbreak-20251

John Grey

1735099 said...

Why wear a mask Bob when they have been found to be totally ineffective?

Except they are - https://www.ucsf.edu/news/2020/06/417906/still-confused-about-masks-heres-science-behind-how-face-masks-prevent

1735099 said...

The virus could have been treated in many different ways, including the use of ivermectin and Dettol.

Ivermectin has reduced mortality in very sick Covid patients, but no randomized trials have confirmed that finding - ICON (Ivermectin in COvid Nineteen) Study: Use of Ivermectin Is Associated with Lower Mortality in Hospitalized Patients with COVID-19
24 Pages Posted: 21 Aug 2020
Juliana Cepelowicz Rajter
Broward Health Medical Center

Michael S. Sherman
Drexel University - College of Medicine


Vaccination is much more effective.

Anonymous said...

"a pretty good job of managing outbreaks"
How casually does Bob dismiss the 800 deaths caused by Dan Andrew's government.
John Grey

Anonymous said...

A brilliant comment from Stephen Crosier:

"we were aware that Grandpa Gropes didn’t have the mental capacity to be a capable pretend president but we were all kind of hoping he would be able to stay up past dinner time when there was important running the country stuff to do.

Oops.

More and more, it looks like this doddering fool will probably get us into a war and then never get out of his official presidential seal pajamas to see how it’s going."

Yet Biden was responsible for an efficient roll out of vaccine? No way, man.
Johm Grey

Anonymous said...

As Time magazine said recently, Trump lost because “a well-funded cabal of powerful people, ranging across industries and ideologies, working together behind the scenes to influence perceptions, change rules and laws, steer media coverage and control the flow of information.”
John Grey

1735099 said...

As Time magazine said recently, Trump lost
You took your time to acknowledge reality.
Somebody should break the news to Dettol Donny.

1735099 said...

Oops.
Funny how Biden has more public support after 100 days than Trump did - https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/biden-approval-rating/
It may have something to do with the fact that he's running the country instead of picking fights and running off at the mouth when he's not on the golf course.
He also hasn't seen the necessity to sack members of his administration at an astounding rate - https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/nov/29/trump-cabinet-white-house-high-level-official-fired-quiz

Anonymous said...

I'm glad the government over-reaction to the Wuhan Flu has been totally minimised in Bob's brain because two retirees were minimally affected.
No need to worry about the working families, school children, small business owners, travellers, isolated elderly, and the sick who suffered. let's not be concerned about the huge Government debt the young people of Australia will carry for a long time.
Bob's OK so all's right with the world.
John Grey

Anonymous said...

Biden is not running the USA.
His handlers are.
The only question is, who are his handlers.
My money is on China. I may be wrong and it is a cabal of would-be socialists.
But a president who can't speak coherently surely can't think coherently.
Putting him up in public in his advanced state of mental decline is elder abuse.
John Grey.

Anonymous said...

It's interesting that leaders who Bob doesn't like are "populists" but those he does like are not - even though the campaign for the popular vote.
John Grey

1735099 said...

My money is on China. I may be wrong and it is a cabal of would-be socialists.
I may be wrong.
You are.
They're actually Calithumpians, or if you listen to Qanon, lizard people.
Which is it?

1735099 said...

let's not be concerned about the huge Government debt the young people of Australia will carry for a long time.
Isn't it only Labor who creates "Debt and deficit disaster"?
The Coalition would never do that.....

Anonymous said...

"Isn't it only Labor who creates "Debt and deficit disaster"?"
Not sure why you are implying I said that.
Or are you just moving to a different argument after I bested you on the evil of debt issue.
John Grey

Anonymous said...

I am astounded that Bob places such belief in the statistics coming out of China.
The Whuhan Flu was developed in China, escaped from China, was kept quiet by China, and deaths were covered up by China.
Despite all this, Bob is happy to promote Chinese statistics.
He has been captured by Chinese propaganda.
John Grey

Anonymous said...

"Which is it?"
So you agree that Biden is being controlled by somebody, it's only the "who?" we are arguing about.
Given that Biden has done so well financially out of China, it's more probable that his handlers are the CCP.
It's a tragedy for America and ultimately Australia.
John Grey

Anonymous said...

"They're actually Calithumpians"
If you are going to try and be funny Bob, at least get your spelling correct.
The way you spelled it, it means "a clown parade", just like your blog.
John Grey

1735099 said...

The way you spelled it, it means "a clown parade", just like your blog.
There's only one clown posts here, and it's not me.

1735099 said...

Given that Biden has done so well financially out of China
You've been reading Breitbart again.
Stop it or you'll go blind.

1735099 said...

The Whuhan (sic) Flu was developed in China, escaped from China, was kept quiet by China, and deaths were covered up by China.
Despite all this, Bob is happy to promote Chinese statistics.

They're as reliable as any others - https://www.researchgate.net/publication/5208873_Are_Chinese_Official_Statistics_Reliable

Anonymous said...

Your reference to Researchgate.net and the article by Chow is in reference to economic data and even then his writings are disputed by others without the obvious connection to those whose data came under scrutiny. Referencing a person with Chinese connections is hardly going to get a result in the negative. I guess that is why you chose him.

Anonymous said...

Thanks for correcting my spelling mistake, Bob.
If I am wrong, I am happy to have my mistakes fixed.
For a bloke who makes so many of your own, your corrections of others smacks of hypocricy and elitism.
Are you happy in your ivory tower of self aggrandisement?
John Grey

1735099 said...

Are you happy in your ivory tower of self aggrandisement?(sic)

Can't afford an ivory tower, and it wouldn't be fair to elephants.
By the way, "self-aggrandisement" has a hyphen.
And I'm very happy, thank you...

Anonymous said...

I love 1735099's come backs.
John Grey should be called John Gay.

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