2019 Novel Coronavirus Covid-19 Discussion

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#2682239 29-Mar-2021 07:19

Handle9: All the worry about prioritization really misses the point. Edge cases absolutely don't matter.

What matters is getting the vaccination program ramped up and vaccinations happening at scale. If one group gets vaccinated a month after another, who really cares? There will always be cases of vaccinated people getting infected as there will be cases of those who don't get vaccinated never getting sick.

For vaccination to be effective you need large numbers to get vaccinated, not to stress out about whether asthmatics or police are more worthy.

Which is exactly the point I raised a few posts up where I asked whether simply vaccinating random people might actually be a great approach.

Ultimately we need jabs in people's arms, and we need to know this is happening. That's what makes the current policy of basically trying to conceal vaccine numbers quite strange.

Batman

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#2682294 29-Mar-2021 08:16

anecdotes of fake covid certificates

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/covid-19-coronavirus-fake-foreign-virus-test-results-highlight-pre-departure-testing-flaws-say-experts/HJMSZTTQKOM7WS7ATLD6F2XS7Y/

Dulouz

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#2682299 29-Mar-2021 08:21

Batman:

anecdotes of fake covid certificates

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/covid-19-coronavirus-fake-foreign-virus-test-results-highlight-pre-departure-testing-flaws-say-experts/HJMSZTTQKOM7WS7ATLD6F2XS7Y/

I would imagine some countries are more high risk for this than others. The solution would be to limit people travelling from certain countries.

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#2682300 29-Mar-2021 08:24

i know what countries you are likely to be thinking of, but the only country named in this article is france

sbiddle

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#2682305 29-Mar-2021 08:33

Batman:

anecdotes of fake covid certificates

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/covid-19-coronavirus-fake-foreign-virus-test-results-highlight-pre-departure-testing-flaws-say-experts/HJMSZTTQKOM7WS7ATLD6F2XS7Y/

Dr Wiles is the main person pitching this story - she is also strongly against pre flight testing actually exiting in the first place and believes this infringes on people's rights to travel.

The reality is this was always going to happen, and having a fake certificate doesn't offer you any advantages entering NZ anyway. You still need to be tested and enter MIQ on arrival in NZ.

The purpose of pre departure testing is for countries and airlines to do everything they can to try and limit the number of people traveling who are infected at the time. Based on a story I read a few weeks ago the fake testing certificate market was mostly targeting people who simply didn't want to fork out the street prices for Covid tests. Paying $25 to get a test online which is emailed to you a few minutes later is a lot easier than having to to through legit channels!

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#2682307 29-Mar-2021 08:56

sbiddle: Should we be vaccinating all of our Police as a priority? We are, but why? How is their risk to society as a whole any different from say a supermarket worker or a bus driver?

A policeman (or other first responder) could be (you could even argue that they are likely to be) called to respond to an emergency where they are required to be in close physical proximity to other, perhaps infectious, people. It makes sense for us to be able to respond to emergencies without having to worry about numbers of our responders placing themselves at risk of illness and/or having to self-isolate for 2 weeks.

Supermarket workers and bus drivers are not in the position of *having* to respond... they always have the option of stepping away and calling in the actual emergency services. And, worst come to worst, they're more easily replaced.

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#2682310 29-Mar-2021 09:01

The whole point of a hypothetical private vaccine is NOT to take vaccines away from current high risk people who are being vaccinated. The whole point would be to provide a parallel supply for those willing to pay. What exactly is wrong with this?

Given that there's a worldwide shortage, vaccine doses for the low-risk wealthy are being taken away from the high-risk poor.

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Scott3

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#2682410 29-Mar-2021 11:42

sbiddle:

Handle9: All the worry about prioritization really misses the point. Edge cases absolutely don't matter.

What matters is getting the vaccination program ramped up and vaccinations happening at scale. If one group gets vaccinated a month after another, who really cares? There will always be cases of vaccinated people getting infected as there will be cases of those who don't get vaccinated never getting sick.

For vaccination to be effective you need large numbers to get vaccinated, not to stress out about whether asthmatics or police are more worthy.

Which is exactly the point I raised a few posts up where I asked whether simply vaccinating random people might actually be a great approach.

Ultimately we need jabs in people's arms, and we need to know this is happening. That's what makes the current policy of basically trying to conceal vaccine numbers quite strange.

The approach of attempting to randomly distribute vaccination in the community has merit to it, when we have a sufficient proportion of the population is vaccinated that the reproduction number is close to, or below one. With the reproduction number below one, outbreaks in the community will die out without other action, and when it is close to one, they will be fairly easy to squash with minor action.

Should note that in itself, getting random distribution is a challenge. Demographic like mine will actively and aggressively seek out a vaccine, and given I have ready access to time & transport, are at a competitive advantage. Other demographics that don't regally deal with (or trust) the medical system, or have challenges around time & transport will lag behind.

Sadly we are no where near the above point. Will take somewhere in the range of 60 - 80% of the population to be vaccinated to get to that point. Even if we had enough doses for 5% of the population (I guess we don't yet, but the government has stopped telling us so can't know for sure), having 5% of the population vaccinated wouldn't materially change the reproduction number, and any outbreaks would still need to be dealt with via lock downs.

As such, It is clearly prudent to initially prioritize vaccines to those at most risk of exposure (border workers, air / sea crew, International travelers, emergency services, defense force, Front line medical staff etc). This gives us best bang for buck at preventing covid-19 spreading. Subsequently it is prudent to vaccinate those who are most at risk of serious harm from covid-19 (elderly, medical conditions etc. Including those who may spread covid-19 to such communities). This gives us the best band for buck at stopping major harm from a larger covid-19 outbreak in the community in the unlikely event one should occure.

Assuming, we are still only getting around 60k doses a week into NZ (sadly we don't get told anymore), and we have 1000+ trained vaccinators, the bureaucracy of getting the vaccines to the priorty groups shouldn't be too burdensome. But, in the middle to latter months of the year, when we are delivering (hopefully) 300k+ doses a week, that bureaucracy risks slowing down our vaccination program. Might be a time where we are best to open vaccination to all, but ask that vaccination centers & medical centers have a priory queue, or appointments set aside for higher priority groups to avoid them missing out. I think quite a few USA states have reached this point now.

But yes, it is very worrying that the government has chosen to end transparency of out vaccine stock. Especially after the issues of last year's flu vaccine roll-out, including officials making false statements.

My gut feeling is that the government is having trouble scaling up the roll-out, and doesn't want the public to see that they have a comically high number of doses in stock... But this seems to clash with the fact that the likes of medical centers & pharmacies are yet to be utilized for distribution.

KrazyKid

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#2682481 29-Mar-2021 13:14

Greater Brisbane going into a 3 day lockdown, 4 community transfer cases found overnight and more expected.

Premier and requested that Brisbane be declared a hotspot.

Personally the risk of getting stuck in a lockdown would put me off travelling to Australia to see my family for another 6 months even if they open the border.
I've got free accommodation with family, but who wants to ring work and tell them I can't be in for another 3 weeks at the end of my holiday?

Once they get the vaccinations programs through a good number of people on both sides of the ditch the story will be different.

Oblivian

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#2682486 29-Mar-2021 13:18

I'm gathering by the way foreign media went nuts about getting travellers positive from NZ. And the prev president used the figures we announced as shortfall. That it was because it dents their local stats and the place that finds them bears the burden instead of the origin?

Kinda blows seeing things like this if it is the case knowing it adds to our stats and not the country they originated.

There are 11 new cases of Covid-19 in managed isolation.

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#2682501 29-Mar-2021 13:41

Need vaccines to have travel bubble I reckon

Iirc AU have less MIQ and more outbreaks?

tdgeek

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#2682511 29-Mar-2021 13:59

Batman: Need vaccines to have travel bubble I reckon

Iirc AU have less MIQ and more outbreaks?

Agree. Despite best efforts its not secure

Fred99

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#2682550 29-Mar-2021 14:39

KrazyKid:

Greater Brisbane going into a 3 day lockdown, 4 community transfer cases found overnight and more expected.

Premier and requested that Brisbane be declared a hotspot.

Two of the 4 also travelled to Byron Bay (NSW) while infectious.

Byron Bay these days is a tourist hotspot, so while they might have gone there to go surfing, stayed in a motel and eaten takeaways, the chance that they hit the town's nightlife must be pretty high. When I was last there, not in main holiday season, the place was seething at night. It would be a bit like Queenstown, if there was CT there, then contact tracing will probably end up being a nationwide issue.

wellygary

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#2682562 29-Mar-2021 15:07

Fred99:

Two of the 4 also travelled to Byron Bay (NSW) while infectious.

Byron Bay these days is a tourist hotspot,

Byron Bay is part of the wider Northern Rivers region of NSW that is well known for its counterculture movements,

Unfortunately this has now extended to include the Anti-vaxx tribes, and presumably the COVID sceptics..

There are historically low vaccination rates here, and I suspect use of QR check in codes and registering visits could also be low...

Could be hard work for contact tracers... esp with the cross border aspect thrown in ....

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#2682643 29-Mar-2021 16:27

Let me get this straight. This guy that has been everywhere...

They don't know how he got the infection correct? That means...

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