COVID-19 in Australia

You can't sit in a cafe now in NSW - all cafes and restaurants are takeaway / delivery only. You aren't supposed to congregate inside while waiting for your food/drink either.

Not sure what measures they have implemented in other states.

 

You cannot take two of three data points and extrapolate that out to show any kind of meaningful conclusion. Much more data is required before we can have any kind of confidence in a trend.

I get that we all want or need to believe that we're past the worst of it yet - but I think it's a much safer approach to assume we're not. We can hope that we are, but please don't expect it.

My wife (Clinical Nurse Consultant with the NSW Health Counter Disaster Unit) is petrified that everyone simply looks at a couple of numbers that have been published and assumes that everything is fine now and stops being vigilant and tries to return to normal behaviours - which will just makes things worse and extend the time taken for us to get this under control, possibly creating a 2nd wave of infections.

There is a reason the govt keeps saying "6 months" about measures because we need to be in the mindset that it may well take that long and we need to keep doing the right things to avoid a 2nd wave of community infection.

Just remember that it only takes 1 infected person to start a pandemic, or to create a second wave of infection.

There is plenty of documented history here too - different cities in the US had different approaches to managing the 1918 Spanish Flu outbreak with very different results - How some cities ‘flattened the curve’ during the 1918 flu pandemic

Two standouts to illustrate my example:



To be clear @paulF - I'm not directing this at you, this is just a general call for everyone to remain vigilant and to keep doing our social distancing, our handwashing, everything we can do to limit the spread - even if numbers do start to show a clear downward trend. The worst thing we can do is to start relaxing before we get to zero active cases.

 

There appear to be discrepancies between that information and the information from other sources


And from Australia Coronavirus: 4,359 Cases and 18 Deaths - Worldometer

 

The only source we should be relying on is the information coming from Australian Government Department of Health - this is your source of truth.

New and cumulative COVID-19 cases in Australia by notification date

All other sources should be considered unreliable. They can only get their information from the Australian Govt anyway.

The worldometers info is most likely updated in a different timezone (it clearly says "0:00 GMT+0" on the chart), which could explain discrepancies there.

Also note this warning, which might be relevant to this discussion:

New and cumulative COVID-19 cases in Australia by notification date

This graph shows new cases of COVID-19 in Australia by the date we were notified of them, as well as a cumulative total of all Australian cases. We update this graph every day. Interpret the most recently reported new cases shown in the graph with caution as there can be delays in reporting.​

So while there may be a drop shown in the most recent data - it may also be that they simply haven't collated all of the information yet and there might be more cases to be added.

 

The big issue with the simplistic data shown in the charts is that we are seeing two very different effects right now.

The peaks we've seen in the past week or so are from imported cases - which is naturally going to drop as border controls and travel restrictions take effect.

What we actually need to be concerned about is community transmission, because it can be much more difficult to track and isn't necessarily being tested for (because people don't meet the risk criteria).

Testing levels have dropped overall because there aren't as many at risk people entering the country. So identified cases will drop as well. That doesn't necessarily mean that the spread of the virus is decreasing - it just means that we don't know where it will be next.

We're entering the next phase of the fight now - it's no longer about stopping it coming into the country, it's about identifying outbreaks within the community and working to contain them.

We're already seeing hotspots in Bondi and Waverley as well as the Barossa Valley in SA - and I'm sure there are others emerging around the country.

What I'd like to see from the DoH is a chart showing the number of new cases excluding imported cases. This will show us community transmission rates - and that curve is likely to still be growing - it's just been hidden because of the sudden influx of imported cases.

 

The ABC has mentioned rising community transmission in NSW. I don't know where they obtained their data.
The rate of new coronavirus cases in NSW is dropping, but community transmission is rising - ABC News

It's a worrying trend. Though numbers are small, and changes may not be statistically significant.

 

They might have access to the underlying data and so can extract the imported cases to show community transmission.

I was going to request the DoH publish the raw data.

 

DoH are tracking the data, they are displaying it on a cumulative basis, but they aren't displaying its daily rates - it's shown on a graph on
Coronavirus (COVID-19) current situation and case numbers

 

I meant if they could publish a table/spreadsheet of new cases by source and update it daily (including historic information) - then other people could do their own manipulation of the data to show other things not shown on the DoH website.

 

If they are Australian citizens, we have to let them come home - if they can get on a flight.

That's why we are putting everyone up in quarantine hotels for 14 days when the arrive in the country.