Covid 19 - Updates from your zones

[Lenny]

We're back into full on lockdown until 14th January \o/ There's exceptions to the current "max 2 people over per day, and only visit once per day" for Christmas and New Years.... that bring it up to 4 people instead.

I'm not super sure how people are going to keep to it, but it seems my grandparents' circles are taking it super seriously (and they're finally 100% on board with getting their boosters in January thank GOODNESS - even two months ago they weren't on board with that). Hopefully that's the more universal attitude? But it's going to be year 2 of Christmas and New Years in lockdown, so we'll see.

[Róisín]

Latest for South Australia: 774 new cases yesterday, which is the highest daily total of the whole pandemic for this state. And it has just been publicised that in Sydney a pathology service has notified 400 infected people that their tests were negative, so those people have been out in the community over Christmas. Superspreader events? Aaarrgh!

[Grade E cat]

Ouch. Wishing you guys good luck with that would be deeply misunderstanding how viruses work.

Meanwhile, we got a new newsworthy case of a fake vaccine pass. A nursing home director. Also, in the midst of our own newly established records for numbers of daily new positive cases, they are talking about January possibly becoming a mess because of too many people being on sick leave at the same time. The "SSSS prologue bingo" continues.

[Róisín]

Yeah, it begins to sound a bit like that, doesn’t it? At least we are both vaxxed, and I have had my booster shot, being immunocompromised. Star is due to have his booster next week.

[JoB]

Wishing you guys good luck with that would be deeply misunderstanding how viruses work.

Or how tests for them work, actually. The "passing grade" for an Ag test here is that it shall flag 75+% of samples with a Ct of 25 or less ("very high virus load") as positive. Back in November, the Paul Ehrlich Institute published a survey of Ag tests sold in Germany ... apparently there are some that will never ever give a positive result ...

At least we are both vaxxed, and I have had my booster shot, being immunocompromised. Star is due to have his booster next week.

Best of luck getting your antibody levels up (and my booster's due in a couple days, too, thanks to making the appointment back when there was a strict "6+ months later" rule ... it's down to 3+ months (recommendation) / 4+ weeks (legal minimum) now - specifically because that's how fast the antibody levels in healthy recipients cease to provide satisfying protection against infection with omicron.)

[wavewright62]

We have Omicron in the country, with more cases every day, but so far all have been caught in the managed isolation system at the border.  So far.  I'm eligible for my booster shot now and will obtain that anon.  I went to a local popular shopping centre for Boxing Day, and absolutely everybody I saw in there was masked.  (that is a requirement, but it was still lovely to see)

[Róisín]

Up until a few weeks ago people were being quite compliant about mask and distancing rules, which is how we managed several days of no new cases at all and quite a few with just a handful of new cases. Then we had a patch where several people broke quarantine while infectious, several others were infected while working at or being isolated in quarantine hotels (which are a damnfool idea, being in the middle of the CBD and having air conditioning that just circulates air between rooms or into the outside without filtering or disinfection, having doors of isolation rooms that open straight into public hallways, and having a completely inadequate supply of PPE gear). The so called quarantine hotels may be cheaper in the short run but are totally inadequate for purpose - we really need a dedicated quarantine facility.

Then we had a few interstate truckies who came here knowingly while they were infected. And a few border jumpers. Worst of all, several infected people who lied about where they had been to contact tracers or didn’t use QR codes at all, plus a few big private parties and sporting events. Plus the stupid ‘freedum’ protests, complete with American placards about things that don’t even apply in Australia - not as bad as the ones in Victoria but still superspreader events. Result, we are now back to several hundred cases a day, dammit. 774 cases yesterday. And we were so close to having no new infections.

[Yastreb]

The number of new cases in Australia is horrifying, considering how we'd apparently smothered infections before (in Victoria, anyway). The latest figures are as follows.

New South Wales: 6,310
Victoria: 1,800
South Australia: 774
Queensland: 711
Australian Capital Territory: 177
Tasmania: 81
Northern Territory: 30
Western Australia: 1

That's a total of slightly under 10,000.

[Róisín]

Here in South Australia, 994 cases today. We are back to the horror numbers. And yesterday we had a young fool who got his positive diagnosis and proceeded to celebrate by spending the night going to several nightclubs, including the very popular ‘Loverboy’. What a murderously stupid thing to do. I gather he is one of those private school types who think the law doesn’t apply to them, and can pay the fine no problems, but the offence of knowingly spreading disease can also carry jail time, which I devoutly hope some court will enforce this time. We do not need upper-class twits ignoring the law and getting away with it, especially if it may cost other people their lives. 

I went to get some pathology tests today, ahead of a medical appointment for which the doctor needs to see beforehand the results of blood tests and a biopsy, for non-covid-related medical problems, and discovered that the testing service has been unexpectedly closed down between yesterday when I made the appointment for the tests and this morning when I turned up for them. Maybe something to do with the covid outbreak a week or so ago at an end of school year event very near there, which may have involved some of their staff. Most annoying for me and for the friend who had made the big trip up from the city to drive me to the appointment. Hope I don’t have to miss the specialist’s appointment for which I have waited six months. Aaarrrgggh!

[JoB]

And yesterday we had a young fool who got his positive diagnosis and proceeded to celebrate by spending the night going to several nightclubs, including the very popular ‘Loverboy’. What a murderously stupid thing to do. I gather he is one of those private school types who think the law doesn’t apply to them, and can pay the fine no problems, but the offence of knowingly spreading disease can also carry jail time, which I devoutly hope some court will enforce this time.

... police is tasked not only with prosecution (of crimes past), but also prevention. Any information where biome-for-brains does his exhaling now?

I went to get some pathology tests today, ahead of a medical appointment for which the doctor needs to see beforehand the results of blood tests and a biopsy, for non-covid-related medical problems, and discovered that the testing service has been unexpectedly closed down between yesterday when I made the appointment for the tests and this morning when I turned up for them. [...] Hope I don’t have to miss the specialist’s appointment for which I have waited six months. Aaarrrgggh!

I take it that there was no information posted at the (closed) door, nor to be had by calling them again (from an answering machine, if need be)? Even if the entire staff had to go to COVID quarantine from one day to the next, I'd hope that they could call someone and have him tape a list of alternative labs at the entrance ...

(Yes, yes, we have a couple doctors' offices here, too, where you get neither forewarned of their "company vacation" nor find any information anywhere once you notice their absence. I tend to remember those guys and where else to go - permanently.)

Good luck finding a competitor, whatever the tests needed and the deadline ...

[Róisín]

One might have hoped so, but the scribbled note taped over the hours on the door gives incorrect info, including that they are open today, and their phone rings out without even going to an answering machine. The alternate service they have in the past suggested just has a message on their phone saying that they are closed indefinitely. This is beginning to be a bit of a worry.

[JoB]

One might have hoped so, but the scribbled note taped over the hours on the door gives incorrect info, including that they are open today, and their phone rings out without even going to an answering machine. The alternate service they have in the past suggested just has a message on their phone saying that they are closed indefinitely. This is beginning to be a bit of a worry.

... are the required tests unusual enough that the specialist's front desk might want to weigh in and try to dig up more addresses, now that there seem two local labs gone MIA?

Edit to add: If only we were talking about Germany, I'd suggest calling your health insurance, whatever professional organization the labs may be in, etc., up to 116117 ...

[Róisín]

That doesn’t work here. What I think is going on is that I know several hospital staff in the hospital to which the testing facility is attached have kids at the school from which the most recent local cluster of covid cases has spread. The hospital itself is closed with no staff or patients present, but the testing signs say that the testing facility is still open within the hospital building. But nobody answers. I am going to try again on Friday, which is the soonest I can get a lift over there. Argh!

[tehta]

Oof.

The part of Italy I have been living in recently in has had pretty low numbers over the last few months, but things have been rising exponentially since Christmas. We just registered over 700 new cases (up from 300ish the previous day) and one in 120 people is now infected. Still better than my home in Switzerland, where it's one in 80, but the sharp increase is what's worrying.

Anyway, I am triple-vaxxed and not particularly vulnerable, so I don't have that much reason to worry for myself. But I'll be putting myself under a mini-lockdown as usual, so as not to be a spreader, so I guess we will be cancelling the NY party we were supposed to have. It shouldn't be too hard: two of the guests have already declined because they have covid...

[thorny]

I guess we will be cancelling the NY party we were supposed to have. It shouldn't be too hard: two of the guests have already declined because they have covid...

Ack!

Yes, I'd cancel that party. Hope they'll be OK.

-- my neighbor came over the other day to say hi and discuss the state of fields a bit: and didn't want to be invited inside because he had something involving coughing and sniffling. Which, a bit later in the conversation, he definitely was; though outside and at a good distance from me.

He's Old Order Mennonite, not masked, almost certainly not vaccinated, and I strongly suspect not going to be tested unless he winds up needing a hospital. Which I really hope he doesn't; but I've decided, despite having had 3 Pfizer shots myself, against taking advantage of a sale right now at the local farm supply store, which is run by Old Order and almost certainly will contain other people who are neither masked nor vaccinated.

(No, he hadn't walked through crowded sidewalks that way to get here; or on any sidewalks at all. He came across the fields, and is highly unlikely to have encountered anybody else en route, even at a distance.)