2019 Novel Coronavirus Covid-19 Discussion

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#2715907 30-May-2021 23:25

Australia is ~2% vaccinated. ~15% is first dose only. With a 12 week gap between doses it'll take a long time.

They aren't planned to be complete by October, they don't have a plan anymore (officially).

mattwnz

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#2715910 31-May-2021 00:09

Handle9: Australia is ~2% vaccinated. ~15% is first dose only. With a 12 week gap between doses it'll take a long time.

They aren't planned to be complete by October, they don't have a plan anymore (officially).

NZs number will also look significantly worse when most will also only have the 1st dose. There is also a lot of confusion in NZ around the vaccine. People can phone up to get it the same or next day, but people seem to think they have to wait to get a call or letter. So at my local hospital they are wondering why people aren't coming to be vaccinated. Also some people have had the flu vaccine, and thought that included the covid one. There needs to be some education being done.

I see in the US, they are looking at incentivizing people to get it, in the form of a lottery and big prize money. Almost enough to buy a good house in Auckland. I can see uptake in NZ won't be that great unless there is something done to get more people to do it. Some may get the first but not second dose etc.

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#2715920 31-May-2021 06:48

Sad story about India

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/may/30/kumbh-mela-how-a-superspreader-festival-seeded-covid-across-india

sbiddle

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#2715921 31-May-2021 07:21

mattwnz:

Australia are at about 15% vaccinated so is at a pretty poor level, although this has increased a lot of the last week. It appears they expect most to be vaccinated by the end of October 2021. Whereas NZ is about 7.5% which is quite a bit worse and we are quite a bit behind the rest of the world.

https://ourworldindata.org/covid-vaccinations?country=OWID_WRL

Australia hit 20% of the adult population who have received their first dose early last week, so will be at least a few percentage points above that now. Their health minister was absolutely slammed when he made this 20% announcement in the media because so many people regard it as a failure. Had it not been for the vaccine hesitancy that has crept in with over 50's purposely not being vaccinated because they all want to wait for Pfizer jabs later in the year, this figure would have been a lot higher.

They are a long way ahead of NZ which sits just under 10% of the adult population (371043 people who have had their first dose out of around 4 million people aged 16+)

sbiddle

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#2715922 31-May-2021 07:31

antonknee:

sbiddle:

…the reality is our new level 4 imposes some pretty significant restrictions above and beyond what we had last year.

I’m not saying you’re wrong, but that doesn’t appear to be true based on what I can see? So what are the above and beyond restrictions?

A quick comparison of the current AL4 as described on covid19.govt.nz to the archived alert level table from the 16th April 2020 shows them to be word for word identical.

They have added the words “sustained and intensive” (community transmission) to the risk assessment and removed “new clusters” from the risk assessment.

The settings certainly match up with what I was doing in Alert level 4 last year - staying at home except for the supermarket and the pharmacy.

The Covid 19 website says this "We have not repeated the same Alert Level 4 information as last year. This is because any possible future move into Alert Level 4 may look different."

Any potential future level 4 lockdown here will very likely impose far stricter rules on movement outside the home for work, essential travel (ie to supermarkets) and exercise along with mandatory mask wearing in all environments outside the home. Many industries and manufacturing businesses that were able to operate last year may also face significant restrictions.

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#2715923 31-May-2021 07:41

mattwnz:

NZs number will also look significantly worse when most will also only have the 1st dose. There is also a lot of confusion in NZ around the vaccine. People can phone up to get it the same or next day, but people seem to think they have to wait to get a call or letter. So at my local hospital they are wondering why people aren't coming to be vaccinated. Also some people have had the flu vaccine, and thought that included the covid one. There needs to be some education being done.

I see in the US, they are looking at incentivizing people to get it, in the form of a lottery and big prize money. Almost enough to buy a good house in Auckland. I can see uptake in NZ won't be that great unless there is something done to get more people to do it. Some may get the first but not second dose etc.

The problem here is just that the process is so different across every DHB.. And it's anybody's guess how far away we are from actually having the ability to book online with the new $38m Salesforce solution.

I ran into more people on the weekend who see no rush to be vaccinated because "there is no Covid in NZ". I'm really not sure how we're going to convince these people to be vaccinated. Confusion with the flu jab is also a very real world problem, and I've certainly heard anecdotal reports from somebody who had been giving flu jabs that quite a few people think the flu jab is their Covid jab. I wonder is there is clear messaging being given by everybody giving flu jabs to people receiving the flu jab that it is not their Covid jab?

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#2715928 31-May-2021 08:02

Those in the north are a whole lot different

Canterbury for instance. Even though doing 1,2 and 3 and likely still have room at the end of the day. If you hit the how do I get it, the page scrolls you to testing locations which say come on down (for testing). I bet people are trying based on that without reading.

Further up however..

We will continue to invite others in Group 3 to book through June and July 2021 . If you are in Group 3, you don’t need to do anything right now – please don’t contact us or your general practice , we’ll contact you when it’s your turn.

But don't believe there is an actual register right now. So like others seem to find up north, if you had a good enough excuse, unsure how can it be proven. Only seems difference is you can't phone up as easy here.

Not heard of anyone in 3/4 thus far. So guessing canty will be slow

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#2715949 31-May-2021 09:10

sbiddle:

Australia weren't fighting Covid either until 7 days ago. The point is we're just in an incredibly precarious position right now with one of the lowest vaccination rates in the world and a virus that's now so much more dangerous.

Yep, just look at Taiwan, our low vaccination rates are a worry.

wellygary

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#2716025 31-May-2021 10:36

sbiddle:

Australia hit 20% of the adult population who have received their first dose early last week, so will be at least a few percentage points above that now. Their health minister was absolutely slammed when he made this 20% announcement in the media because so many people regard it as a failure. Had it not been for the vaccine hesitancy that has crept in with over 50's purposely not being vaccinated because they all want to wait for Pfizer jabs later in the year, this figure would have been a lot higher.

We are pretty much swinging in the wind till the Pfizer ramp up occurs in July .....

Australia have a better supply, but its still not great until Q4, and the 300K per week in June is a big crimp (on a pro rate basis its pretty much the same as our 60K a week...)

" Pfizer, approximately 350,000 doses a week are arriving at the moment. They boosted it up for this month, next month is approximately 300,000 doses, and then over the July, August September quarter we will have the equivalent of 600,000 a week. Those specific weekly amounts have not yet been confirmed, so it's a quarterly figure. Then that again is replicated in the last quarter of the year with an additional 20 million on top of that."

https://www.pm.gov.au/media/press-conference-australian-parliament-house-act-40

But, and here is the big but, Australia still have pretty much unlimited AZ for the 50+ group.. So that's where all their big vaccination numbers are coming from...

NZ could start to catch up through July/Aug Sept as we have been told that we will get 8.5M doses of Pfizer over those 3 months.. while OZ will get only 7.2M... with a much bigger population....

KrazyKid

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#2716038 31-May-2021 10:56

No idea why people are complaining about (or surprised, or even comparing) our low vaccination rates at the moment.

The fact that we are only getting significant supplies from July has been well signposted form back we we decided to go 100% Pfizer at the beginning of the year.

We are locked in to a plan and changing horses at the moment is not practical.

If we continue to be careful with our bubble and react quickly (as we are doing now) we should be fine.

Yes things could be improved in the system, but it's not all doom and gloom at then moment.
The government has shown they can and do review and improve things as the go.

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#2716044 31-May-2021 11:14

KrazyKid:

No idea why people are complaining about (or surprised, or even comparing) our low vaccination rates at the moment.

The fact that we are only getting significant supplies from July has been well signposted form back we we decided to go 100% Pfizer at the beginning of the year.

We are locked in to a plan and changing horses at the moment is not practical.

If we continue to be careful with our bubble and react quickly (as we are doing now) we should be fine.

Yes things could be improved in the system, but it's not all doom and gloom at then moment.
The government has shown they can and do review and improve things as the go.

This.

A major reason why we are not seeing major advertising push to get vaccinated - my DHB has information on the front of their web page that invited Group 3 to get vaccinated now but is doing no other advertising and no push invitations - is that if we push hard now we would most likely run out of vaccine in late June.

That would be completely counter-productive to the general messaging on Covid vaccination [and even worse, it might mean I'd have my second dose postponed ;)]

Once Pfizer have confirmed the vaccine delivery schedule for July, I'd expect to see more definite and louder messaging from the government. I believe, from what Chris Hipkins has said previously, that Pfizer are only confirming deliveries a few weeks in advance, so I'd guess another week or two before the MoH will be in a position to publish a plan

wellygary

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#2716117 31-May-2021 11:54

PolicyGuy:

Once Pfizer have confirmed the vaccine delivery schedule for July, I'd expect to see more definite and louder messaging from the government. I believe, from what Chris Hipkins has said previously, that Pfizer are only confirming deliveries a few weeks in advance, so I'd guess another week or two before the MoH will be in a position to publish a plan

To meet 8.5 million doses delivered in 12 weeks is an average of ~700K a week, once it kicks into high gear the rollout ramp up should be pretty steep...

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#2716134 31-May-2021 12:32

Handle9: Australia is ~2% vaccinated. ~15% is first dose only. With a 12 week gap between doses it'll take a long time.

I thought a 2 or 3 week gap was optimal?

Oblivian

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#2716135 31-May-2021 12:39

frankv:
Handle9: Australia is ~2% vaccinated. ~15% is first dose only. With a 12 week gap between doses it'll take a long time.

I thought a 2 or 3 week gap was optimal?

Az = 10-12 plan.

Aussies I've heard from, 2nd booking 3 months out

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#2716145 31-May-2021 13:13

The UK moved towards a 12 week period for AZ earlier in the year because data showed it improved the efficacy of the vaccine. Recent data further backs that move that a longer period between the 1st and 2nd dose is better.

The real problem is it's clear now that protection against some strains such as the B.1.617 variants (Indian strain) is not that great after the 1st AZ dose but improves significantly after the 2nd dose.

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