- Sep 20, 2018
- 6,470
- 17,423
- AFL Club
- North Melbourne
He might not be dismissing them just weighing them as les important in the light of other considerations.
For example reopening as these little clusters are happening... I'm thinking of the school and the miscommunication re the third child that was discussed just upthread.
It's different doing that after you've seen a pattern of three or four events like that as opposed to doing so around the time of the first one. You're in a much better position to prevent a third outbreak immediately as the second is controlled and that third outbreak might otherwise cause greater economic problems.
To me an extra week or two before opening up again (and it will be a bit of open slather when that does happen) or even a month is better than the sort stop start thing that happened between the first lockdown and now. Because there will be no benefit to the economy or employment in that situation.
Especially if during that time these minor outbreaks are happening regularly and the Andrews gov is finally getting it's sh*t together in terms of managing it.
If Andrews isn't confident of preventing that situation (and don't say "get someone who can" cos who is there available to do that?) then he has to hold off. Whether he alone is too incompetent or the situation is beyond anyone's competence is irrelevant, the consequences of a failure may be too serious to take that risk at that point.
In an emergency, which this situation is, even here in NSW still, you respond/rescue then you begin the recovery and restoring of normality. The roadmap out is part of the recovery process. It seems Victoria has not got to that bit yet, at least from the outside.
It is pretty clear that he doesn't listen to any concerns. It is not just about a bunch of business people demanding to be open now it is about what happens when they do open.
The idea that another month isn't that big a deal is naive. Our current levels of new infections are well below the rate of infections that NSW managed to address and suppress without shutting down their economy. The current levels of infection are well below that which we suppressed in Victoria in the first wave with much less restrictive measures. For example, general retail was not shut down in the first wave. We need to be able to live with minor outbreaks even if they are caused by the ineptness of the DHHS.
On the original roadmap out the progression to stage 3 with the 5 + % target was based on modelling with a very conservative set of assumptions that indicated at that point with our response capability the likelihood of another surge or wave was 3%. We are currently at 6.1 + 10. What is the difference in probability of that new surge? It is not unreasonable to expect to receive that level of information.