2019 Novel Coronavirus Covid-19 Discussion

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#2481925 12-May-2020 14:15

TeaLeaf:

KrazyKid:

as everyone has to use their sim card number or national ID when entering a business etc.)

This is what I meant about how can it work if we are not Communist and cannot force peoples telephony habits. How exactly does the Singapore app work?

I know GPS would be a waste of time. Personally I never have mine on unless I need a service that requires it. So surely its not based around peoples phone usage? I dont know enough about the apps hence the questions.

https://www.theverge.com/interface/2020/5/8/21250744/apple-google-contact-tracing-england-germany-exposure-notification-india-privacy

I think this was a good discussion on how the tracking could work and some of the issues involved

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DS248

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#2481926 12-May-2020 14:15

Or perhaps (more likely?) the infection was picked up sometime in the last 40+ days?

I came back from Japan mid-Feb. A potential future imported case? Hopefully never put to the test!

mattwnz

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#2481928 12-May-2020 14:20

Technofreak: A restaurant can have any number of patrons so long as they abide by the social distancing rules that have been laid down including up to 10 people per group/table yet churches are not free to operate using similar guidelines.

While I don't condone such action I would suggest that if a church was to conduct a church service, abiding by the same rules as restaurants will be using, the authorities would have a hard time justifying taking action against that church.

I understand there is a 2 hour limit at restaurants they are imposing, and all people must be seated. There is actually a lot thought into why some things are not permitted, and the church one is for a similar reason that they are also only allowing 10 at funerals. In South Korea I understand that churches were an issue, with the superspreader.

Those groups in the restaurant will not normally know one another, so will not be interacting with other isolated groups, and it is limited to 100 per restaurant, and 10 per group. They are socially distanced by tables. Churches are a large group of people who all come together to be with one another, so many who know one another, and is often why churches are referred to as a family. The last thing we want is a 100 people all going around hugging one another after this, or big groups outside hugging and socializing. Churches also often have social activities such as morning tea after the service, and then group meetings and other activities after the service and throughout the week. It is exactly the same reason why we can't have more than 10 people in our homes. They are trying to make sure that if someone is discovered to have the virus, that with the manual contact tracing system they are using, they can trace people back quickly and easily.

Just imagine if there was a breakout in a church, that could potentially take a huge amount of the tracing resources, and if that occurs we may end up in level 3 again to get people isolated again, as our tracing system can't get overwhelmed. Whereas if it was a restaurant, only the people in the group and the server would be direct contacts they would need to directly contact, and others in the restaurant may or may not need to self isolate. Although this whole self isolation thing , where many people haven't, is weak area IMO. So I really hope there are not going to be cases popping up , and IMO we should have got all these current cases ring fenced before relaxing opening restaurants and schools. But I suspect many people won't go for some time.

I think one of the main things with level 2, is people not leaving their house if they are unwell at all, except to seek medical help. eg don't go to work school or shops if you are sick at all. But it is a habit that is difficult to break in NZ, as in the past it has been normal to still work if you have a cold. But now we can't.

dejadeadnz

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#2481932 12-May-2020 14:26

Technofreak:

While I don't condone such action I would suggest that if a church was to conduct a church service, abiding by the same rules as restaurants will be using, the authorities would have a hard time justifying taking action against that church.

It's not for him, you, I or anybody to decide which laws of the land we feel like obeying. And the law enforcers would not need any justification for enforcing the law -- the law is the law. Its moral force lies with the fact that the underlying legislation was passed by a legitimate legislature.

I am tired of people thinking that generally reasonable and certainly legitimately passed laws exist for people to treat as negotiable items and to be randomly judged based on the dictates of their own tastes and conscience. The authorities need to enforce the bloody law and, if necessary, use proportionate force to shut down any illegal services.

nzkiwiman

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#2481997 12-May-2020 14:50

Just been told; everyone back in the office from next Monday - exceptions need to be confirmed by two managers.

This is based on the head of the company saying the company default is "return to work"; which doesn't seem to align with what is on the COVID website "Most businesses can operate if they can do so safely. Alternative ways of working are still encouraged where possible". Our entire company can continue to work remotely and has been since Alert Level 4, with only a handful of key staff working from the office.

While I have been one of those key people working from the office, there has obviously been next to no one else in the office; and while the chance of catching something from someone is very low, with the main risk of spread is from long periods of time with close contact in a poorly ventilated office space. As a result, my concern is low-medium, having gone from low (my concern level was also low-medium at the start of level 3, but when the office environment stayed the same my concern dropped)

Technofreak

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#2482000 12-May-2020 14:57

mattwnz:

Technofreak: A restaurant can have any number of patrons so long as they abide by the social distancing rules that have been laid down including up to 10 people per group/table yet churches are not free to operate using similar guidelines.

While I don't condone such action I would suggest that if a church was to conduct a church service, abiding by the same rules as restaurants will be using, the authorities would have a hard time justifying taking action against that church.

I understand there is a 2 hour limit at restaurants they are imposing, and all people must be seated. There is actually a lot thought into why some things are not permitted, and the church one is for a similar reason that they are also only allowing 10 at funerals. In South Korea churches were an issue with the superspreader

Those groups in the restaurant will not normally know one another, so will not be interacting with other isolated groups. They are socially distanced by tables. Churches are a large group of people, many who know one another, and is often why churches are referred to as a family. The last thing we want is a 100 people all going around hugging one another after this, or big groups outside hugging and socializing. Churches also often have social activities such as morning tea after the service, and then group meetings and other activities after the service and throughout the week. It is exactly the same reason why we can't have more than 10 people in our homes. They are trying to make sure that if someone is discovered to have the virus, that with the manual contact tracing system they are using, they can trace people back quickly and easily.

Just imagine if there was a breakout in a church, that could potentially take a huge amount of the tracing resources, and if that occurs we may end up in level 3 again to get people isolated again, as our tracing system can't get overwhelmed. Where as if it was a restaurant, only the people in the group and the server would be direct contacts they would need to directly contact, and others in the restaurant may or may not need to self isolate. Although this whole self isolation thing , where many people haven't, is weak area, so I really hope there are not going to be cases popping up IMO we should have got all these current cases ring fenced before relaxing opening restaurants and schools. But I suspect many people won't go for some time.

I would normally split up your post into separate quotes to make it easier to understand which part of you post I was replying to, however the forum now gets it tits in a tangle if there's more than a couple of quotes. Instead I have highlighted the points I'm replying to.

There is actually a lot thought into why some things are not permitted, and the church one is for a similar reason that they are also only allowing 10 at funerals. The funeral directors association don't agree. https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/health/coronavirus/300009958/coronavirus-funeral-directors-blast-rules-on-funerals-and-tangi-as-cruel-and-without-compassion

In South Korea churches were an issue with the superspreader. Yes, there was an issue in Korea with churches. That was before any social distancing was implemented. I don't think using that example is valid in the context of what I'm talking about here.

Those groups in the restaurant will not normally know one another, In some communities perhaps they won't know each other, in other smaller communities it's almost certain there will opportunity for interaction between groups known to each other. I'd go as far as to say two smaller groups could quite easily attempt to join each other and still be under the 10 person limit.

They are socially distanced by tables. Just as church goers can be socially distanced by seats.

The last thing we want is a 100 people all going around hugging one another after this, or big groups outside hugging and socializing. Churches also often have social activities such as morning tea after the service, and then group meetings and other activities after the service and throughout the week. Give people some credit for being able to restrain from this sort of activity. Before the lockdown many churches in New Zealand had already implemented precautions that modified the way their services were conducted.

FWIW from I've seen no there's more hugging at a church service than I would see at a restaurant or anywhere else where people meet. Even though hugging might be allowed within in a group of 10 or less in Level 2 I'd suggest hugging etc would be a silly idea.

If the church cannot operate under the same/similar guidelines as used by restaurants then the services cannot be held, but if they can I cannot see why they cannot have their services. I rather suspect the restaurant industry has made much more noise and applied much more pressure to the government than the churches have hence the reason why there is this inequity in the way this has been handled.

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#2482001 12-May-2020 15:09

nzkiwiman:

... This is based on the head of the company saying the company default is "return to work"; ...

Of course, he/she is prepared to sit in the same office space as the rest of you?

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Technofreak

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#2482013 12-May-2020 15:14

dejadeadnz:

Technofreak:

While I don't condone such action I would suggest that if a church was to conduct a church service, abiding by the same rules as restaurants will be using, the authorities would have a hard time justifying taking action against that church.

It's not for him, you, I or anybody to decide which laws of the land we feel like obeying. And the law enforcers would not need any justification for enforcing the law -- the law is the law. Its moral force lies with the fact that the underlying legislation was passed by a legitimate legislature.

I am tired of people thinking that generally reasonable and certainly legitimately passed laws exist for people to treat as negotiable items and to be randomly judged based on the dictates of their own tastes and conscience. The authorities need to enforce the bloody law and, if necessary, use proportionate force to shut down any illegal services.

You can be as tired as you like, some people don't consider this limitation to be reasonable. I think they have a point and I explained why in a previous post. There is a multitude of instances in history where people have resorted to civil disobedience in order to get an unreasonable law changed. Just because it is the law it doesn't make it necessarily right.

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#2482016 12-May-2020 15:21

The two hour time limit is going to suck for cinema's

As an example No Time to Die runs at 2:43....

It might not even be worth opening if they are stuck playing exclusively 90min comedy's, while laying out the theater for 1 meter spacing, and collecting contact tracing infomation. Neither Hoyts or Event have a re-opening data on their websites.

dejadeadnz

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#2482023 12-May-2020 15:26

Technofreak:

You can be as tired as you like, some people don't consider this limitation to be reasonable. I think they have a point and I explained why in a previous post. There is a multitude of instances in history where people have resorted to civil disobedience in order to get an unreasonable law changed. Just because it is the law it doesn't make it necessarily right.

Great, so you are now basically speaking in defence of the lawless, stupid and unreasonable, all the whilst pretending not to be. They are advocating utter lawlessness towards a perfectly reasonable, legitimately passed, and public welfare-regarding (remember, whether anyone personally agrees with the substance of the law isn't the issue). What a wonderful human being you are.

Part of being a productive, mature and reasonable adult is to recognise that in exchange for the general comforts offered by civilised society, along with the chance to influence the systems of law-making every few years, you go and play by the legitimate rules. If these dicks want a Hobbesian state of nature (Google this if you don't understand the reference) then the authorities need to take the gloves off and absolutely deal to them, including the use of substantial force if required.

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#2482028 12-May-2020 15:33

Technofreak:
I would normally split up your post into separate quotes to make it easier to understand which part of you post I was replying to, however the forum now gets it tits in a tangle if there's more than a couple of quotes.

We also subscribe to Wheaton's Law, so don't be a dick. This is your only warning.

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#2482031 12-May-2020 15:36

KrazyKid: I don't think the lack of a contract tracing app is a reason for the limits. Notice we are pretty much following the Aussie guidelines and they almost have an app running.
I am sure the MoH discusses regularly with Aussie health departments and everyone thinks a tracing app is nice to have but not essential.

Pretty much this from what I understand.

The app is still being worked on but I think they are holding off before Google/Apple release their updated APIs and background bluetooth capabilities.

I just discussed exactly this with someone working on the peripheral of the response and my personal view is the whole bluetooth approach should be scrapped or available as a secondary opt-in approach.

My preference is for a purely anonymised QR code exchange between consenting parties. I enter a place of work / restaurant etc they present a custom QR code for me to scan on a tablet and then both locations know about each other. Each person then needs to scan with a new QR code. This equally would apply out and about where the phone could present a QR code for someone you didn't know or "just wanted to remember meeting with then and chatting for 10 mins".

That way it would be an explicit opt-in where you were intentionally sharing the fact that you were at the place or met with this person.

Whereas the bluetooth approach is a implicit opt-in where the assumption is it "just works in the background" when we all know there are many factors that prevent that from happening such as paired headphones playing music stops background scanning, and if you have a glucose monitor via BT for some diabetics then that stops it working too as it can't have an active BT connection for background scanning and broadcast to work from what I understand.

Sure there are all sorts of privacy, security and technology issues around it. So many I don't know where to start.

The other issue already discussed is for it to be realistically effective there needs to be a 60%+ uptake or more which I think is unrealistic in NZ... I think if we get over 40% adoption the country has done really well, but the reality is that it is still too low to be effective so can only supplement existing manual processes.

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#2482032 12-May-2020 15:37

Law, civil disobedience?

Just stop. This is about COVID-19.

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#2482035 12-May-2020 15:39

Technofreak: I

I think the PM explained the reasoning quite well today supported by the Director General at 1pm if you haven't yet watched it.

I understand she did say that basically, if people are coming together for any social gathering, it is groups of up to ten. I don't think it is much more clear than that.

But PM told us last night on live chat that it will be reassessed in 2 weeks. A restaurant is basically a place that will contain several isolated groups of up to 10.

dejadeadnz

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#2482036 12-May-2020 15:49

There's also an issue that people who think Tamaki and Co's proposed conduct is some kind of legitimate civil disobedience have utterly failed to consider: for civil disobedience to be meaningful, you have to have a genuine belief that the action to be taken will likely have a worthwhile impact in either directly changing the state of affairs complained of and that there are few or even no other realistic alternatives to the unlawful acts to protest/challenge the status quo. Otherwise, all you are doing is breaking the law for its own sake, i.e. being a lawless prat and doing a stunt. On the first front, the PM has already said that gathering rules will be reviewed as the situation develops, so the idea that somehow anyone will leap to a change because Tamaki and his fellow cultists are putting on a stunt is just farcical.

Secondly, the court system remains available to Tamaki and his cultists, along with anyone else that feels similarly strongly, to challenge the Level 2 requirements as being ultra vires of the empowering law. The merely fact that few others have raised similar noises is pretty indicative of the underlying merits of the proposed stunt. In that light, in balancing the risks of potential public harm and any benefits likely to be accrued by the stunt (if it is enacted), a reasonably person would have to say that it's not going to achieve much utility.

I notice that this is the second time in a short period where @Technofreak has decided to defend publicity stunts of this nature, where people were either blatantly proposing to/actually breaching lockdown rules or at least doing things that encouraged unnecessary bunching up of people/driving towards an area (i.e. the Auckland RSA President and his wreath laying stunt on ANZAC Day). You might think this is really principled but, dare I say it, you are just falling for stunts.

Edit: So my question for people who love these little stunts is this: is a bit of publicity worth the risk of killing someone or sending people to hospital?

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