2019 Novel Coronavirus Covid-19 Discussion

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#2780921 20-Sep-2021 10:42

GV27:

DS248:

These is no comparison between the current situation in Auckland, and the situation that existed in Wellington, even at its worst.

Wellington, from memory, still had cases and they were from household contacts. Only recently (last couple of days) were they declared fully recovered.

...

Yes, from my recollection also, they were all household contacts - of confirmed C19 patients and hence all in isolation. Not aware of any inter-household spread that occurred in Wellington (or if it was, it was a minor compenent)

Far different from the current situation in Auckland, even apart from the much larger daily case numbers up here.

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Scott3

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#2780926 20-Sep-2021 10:59

GV27:

Oblivian:

And this went well..

Yes, it is going well. Now there's no hiding the fact that there's an absolute shedload of Kiwis who want to come home and we have no possible way to house that many of them in MIQ.

It's probably a decent reality check for everyone involved - overseas Kiwis who seem to want to dictate terms to a country that is bending over backwards to nail down Covid at great social and economic cost, and the government who insisted their old MIQ site was functioning fine and that issues with bots or third parties charging massive fees were not something worth seriously acknowledging.

Now the demand is there for all to see, and the inadequacies of the former booking system can be fully appreciated.

The queue system might also suck, but it least it sucks in a pretty fairly distributed way.

I would say that this change is really positive too. It was always known the number of interested was going to far outstrip the number of rooms available.

But this approach adds transparency regarding by how much (apparently the queue was about 25,000 long), and adds fairness as to how the rooms are allocated (no longer can those running scripts dominate the system).

Critically the new system is much less time consuming for people. Replace 60+ hours a week of refreshing a website a week, with logging in between 8-9am NZ time once a fortnight, waiting untill after 9, seeing were you sit in the queue, giving up if hopeless & checking back ever 10mins of so for the next couple of hours to see if you hit the front of the queue if your ranking has hope.

One thing that it does make clear is that every time the government approves group bookings, they are allowing a priory access above 10's of thousands of kiwis that also want those rooms. I.e. For october: (Dubai expo 72, Crankworks: 70, Antarctic programs: 351, NZDF: 82 , mariner workers: 222, Exporters 25, Black caps: 24). Suspect the public will expect group allocations for stuff like foreign sports teams to be stopped in this light. Full list below.

https://www.miq.govt.nz/travel-to-new-zealand/secure-your-place-in-managed-isolation/group-allocations/

Should note that 25,000 in the queue means 25,000 passports applying, not that 25,000 rooms are wanted. If my family wanted to go through MIQ, we would only book a single room, but we have 5 valid passports around 3 people, so it would be logical for us to put all 5 into the lobby, wait for the random queue ranking, and then cancel / abandon the process for all but the top ranked one.

I think that having more chances for multiple people willing to share a room is good. However people with multiple valid passports with multiple chances isn't really. Assume a small enough number of people are in this position that it's not a massive deal.

Still think there needs to be some basic priory system, that can be verified super easy.

i.e.

#1 Urgent need for travel (but not emergency level). I.e. currently overstaying, or visa soon to expire.

#2 priority, people who haven't been in NZ since march 2020, and are willing to sing a declaration saying they accept they agree that immigration will block then from exiting if they try to leave in the next 6 months.

#3 priority, NZ Citizens who it is their first time using MIQ.

and so on.

Having people who are overstaying as they can't get back into NZ at the same priority as people who want to come home to NZ (or pop overseas) to see family for a couple of weeks, or attend a conference is kinda nuts.

DS248

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#2780928 20-Sep-2021 11:10

The cases over the last couple of days do not necessarily mean we are not still on track to elimination. We are still within the bounds of exponential decay in cases.

As can be seen more clearly in the top plot, there were periods of up to two weeks during the fall in case numbers in the Aug20 outbreak where the trend in case numbers was basically static.

But there are danger signs. The current situation could well soon change if Auckland drops down to L3 (at least without additional L3 restrictions) and/or cases continue to hold up or start increasing.

The difference this time is (1) Delta and (2) the current numbers are higher than even the peak Aug20 numbers.

Scott3

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#2780929 20-Sep-2021 11:14

Ge0rge:
Oblivian:

And this went well...

I wonder how many of those 21k are in the same "bubble" - ie Mum, Dad and three kids all individually in the lobby to up the chances of one of them getting a room.

Kid 3 shouts eureka, and four other people then drop out of the queue?

We will never know exactly, but I would speculate that there would be at least double the number of passports in the lobby as people are seeking rooms.

Between groups & people with multiple passports per person (Not that uncommon for people who have migrated to or away from NZ).

As I mention prior, our family of 3 could put 5 passports in the mix if we wanted a room. We currently don't, but it wouldn't be too far-fetched that we would. We normally go to visit my in laws overseas once a year around Christmas, and my partner is badly missing them. Obviously our issues pale in comparison to those who are overseas with expired visa's etc.

In the background it seems the government doesn't want the legality of the MIQ system tested in court, so just give you are room if you file legal action... on condition you drop said action.

https://www.rnz.co.nz/national/programmes/checkpoint/audio/2018811717/nz-woman-given-miq-spot-after-launching-legal-action

Scott3

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#2780934 20-Sep-2021 11:32

DS248:

The cases over the last couple of days do not necessarily mean we are not still on track to elimination. We are still within the bounds of exponential decay in cases.

As can be seen more clearly in the top plot, there were periods of up to two weeks during the fall in case numbers in the Aug20 outbreak where the trend in case numbers was basically static.

But there are danger signs. The current situation could well soon change if Auckland drops down to L3 (at least without additional L3 restrictions) and/or cases continue to hold up or start increasing.

The difference this time is (1) Delta and (2) the current numbers are higher than even the peak Aug20 numbers.

Being on track to elimination isn't partially useful, unless we are on track to do so in a reasonable time. Current lock-downs are costing cura $1b a week.

If our leak rate from MIQ is 1:200 positive cases, and we are currently getting around 3 cases a day, we would expect an average return period on leaks of about 2 months. Less than the approx 100 day elimination time projected by your line.

We may well have just eliminated covid-19 and hit level 1 when we have our next leak...

In my eyes moving down to level 3 is a clear move to a suppression strategy rather than elimination.

MileHighKiwi

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#2780944 20-Sep-2021 12:03

Scott3:

In my eyes moving down to level 3 is a clear move to a suppression strategy rather than elimination.

Had this discussion with my wife earlier. It is not under control in the slightest, its like a boiling pot and the lid is ready to burst off. Any loosening of restrictions will lead to a rapid increase in cases across the country. Today's Cabinet meeting is the most important to date.

A Maori health expert has called for L4 for Waikato. You can bet the Maori caucus is very vocal about the need to protect our vulnerable communities. IMO keeping covid from our most deprived areas is Ardern's goal and its close to slipping from her fingers.

Daynger

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#2781050 20-Sep-2021 12:11

Its a damned if you do damned if you dont situation for our PM today.

Auckland is clearly crying out to be let out, but if we do, and covid takes a grip the last five weeks have been for nothing.

Batman

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#2781051 20-Sep-2021 12:12

meanwhile the elephant in the room. i'm surprised there was no 10pm news conference last night - waikato not happy https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/health/coronavirus/126432913/covid19-waikato-leaders-angry-at-government-officials-for-allowing-man-to-bring-coronavirus-across-border

GV27

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#2781053 20-Sep-2021 12:15

Who wants some good news? Today, my WFH is being disrupted by a vaccination bus blaring on a loudspeaker at members of the public to come get vaccinated. I live in one of the surveillance suburb, this is an excellent thing, but probably would have been better to have a bit sooner than D-Day for L4.

I am quite happy to be disrupted by this.

DS248

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#2781057 20-Sep-2021 12:19

Scott3:

...

Being on track to elimination isn't partially useful, unless we are on track to do so in a reasonable time. Current lock-downs are costing cura $1b a week.

...

I agree but a premature drop to L3 could ultimately prove a lot more expensive than an extra two weeks of L4. Only need to look across the ditch for examples. It was clear from around the time of the peak that this would be a long haul (or were we somehow going to magically drop numbers down to zero in 2 - 3 weeks when past experience suggests otherwise)

Dropping now with the current case numbers (regardless of today's figures) would be a signal that the government has given up on elimination, despite any spin about 'contained'.

Eighteen months in, I wonder how much serious research has gone into refining the level restrictions to optimise health and economic outcomes. There are additional activities that could occur in L4 with very low risk.

Other options include clamping down on inter-household mingling (coupled with additional support to make that easier/possible) and/or shifting the northern L4 boundary down to the harbour bridges. But would they have the courage ...

Oblivian

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#2781058 20-Sep-2021 12:21

GV27:

Who wants some good news? Today, my WFH is being disrupted by a vaccination bus blaring on a loudspeaker at members of the public to come get vaccinated. I live in one of the surveillance suburb, this is an excellent thing, but probably would have been better to have a bit sooner than D-Day for L4.

I am quite happy to be disrupted by this.

Flipside to that, the nutters think there should be no need to incentivize or do such campaigns unless it really was a good thing, or there is some bad juju behind the govt pushing it so hard.

There was a warning from local CHC police last night to people door knocking offering jabs for money. Many of the comments had nothing to do with the warning, other than 'they would need to pay me to get it'. And 'I wouldn't put it past the govt that they were behind it' Or 'why do they need to incentivize the jab for a prize lottery if it's so safe' etc etc

ezbee

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#2781063 20-Sep-2021 12:28

It may be coincidence but supermarket at fancy end of town is busier than I have ever seen it on a Monday morning.
Others normal to slow by look as I drove past.

Maybe people have come back in from their holiday homes in anticipation of Level 3 Auckland restarting their business ?
Or it could be people wanting to hunker down with supplies for a bit longer incase Level 3 goes pear shaped.

Sealing off Waikato is probably not realistic given the breadth or roads criss crossing the boarders.
We would not have the police and defense force numbers to stake them all out.
Auckland at least some more natural choke points.

Batman

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#2781064 20-Sep-2021 12:28

tdgeek:

mattwnz:

Watch todays standup when they were discussing this. The PM said there wasn't 'widespread' community transmission occurring. The PM didn't say that there wasn't any community transmission, just that it wasn't widespread.

Its large families intermixing. As compared to randoms infecting other randoms in the community. Given how Delta spreads, by now it should be throughout Auckland, but it's not.

Have we managed to link all the unlinked cases? Serious question.

Oblivian

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#2781068 20-Sep-2021 12:39

Daynger:
Its a damned if you do damned if you dont situation for our PM today.

Auckland is clearly crying out to be let out, but if we do, and covid takes a grip the last five weeks have been for nothing.

More so than previously.

Not level 3. Red face, oops. But 'we did say circumstance may change this '
Vs let us out

Level 3 'are you nuts' vs hurrah!

Still 2 outside (which is expected)
Why not 1 vs this is going to cost us payouts

shk292

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#2781070 20-Sep-2021 12:40

DS248:

Other options include clamping down on inter-household mingling (coupled with additional support to make that easier/possible) and/or shifting the northern L4 boundary down to the harbour bridges. But would they have the courage ...

You raise a good point. From the Hibiscus Coast, the problem area looks a long way away, especially when the closest LOI is about 20 minutes drive south and was last a possible cause of infection 17 days ago. It must be even more frustrating if you're in Warkworth or GBI.

It would be interesting if everyone posting on this forum stated their location as well as their opinion on Level change. For me, it's Hibiscus Coast and very firmly on the fence about a change

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