Covid 19 and footy - season (suspended) now resumed

[Boddo]

agree with dr Kelly they the nrl wants to control virus talk about opening season in ,may. they like the afl should only start when the health experts say. We must self isolate and not have any gatherings of more than 2. Funerals only allowed 10 so what sets these sports apart. at least the afl are waiting

Not just health experts. Decision will be made with input from all government advisers. The final
decision will not lie with just the health experts. Because if that was the case we wouldn’t have a climate change issue. I.e governments only listen to scientists when it suits them.

A funeral is not a workplace. Neither is going to the beach nor going to a park. Unlike most sports played on the weekend people forget this is their employment & a workplace.

It’s a balancing act of trying to keep the economy going as well as limiting the spread and deaths. As much as everyone keeps saying stay at home let’s save lives I’m afraid to say society will change that attitude very quickly once all the stimulus runs out and people can’t afford to live from week to week. Because believe it or not there is no bottomless pit of money.

IMO the government is preparing to reopen the economy with social distancing etc. it’s why even with the flattening of the curve they are still obtaining more ventilators, pushing police numbers through academies, doing the same with nurses, obtaining more drones etc.

Why are they doing this when as we speak hospitals are like ghost towns. If you don’t believe me go look at any ED in any city.


There will be an AFL season this year imo. Everything points to it.

[rb4x]

NRL is basically insolvent. They are setting a date in May knowing full well that it is most unlikely but when they are told they can not restart they will then claim it is the fault of the government and will put in a claim for many millions to bail them out.

[Boddo]

NRL is basically insolvent. They are setting a date in May knowing full well that it is most unlikely but when they are told they can not restart they will then claim it is the fault of the government and will put in a claim for many millions to bail them out.

NRL 2020: V’landys, coronavirus, NSW government, COVID-19, Wayne Bennett, Project Apollo, season, restart, | Fox Sports

[rb4x]

Has Mick Fuller forgotten about the 1.5 meter social distancing rule. That would apply in a workplace. Would love to see a rugby league game where players are not allowed to be within 1.5 meters of each other.

[KTigers]

I think I'm with Tony Shepherd the GWS chairman who can't see much difference between a footy isolation hub and a cruise ship.
I get that the codes are very desperate for money but it might be best if no one dies from this loopy idea.

[Boddo]

Has Mick Fuller forgotten about the 1.5 meter social distancing rule. That would apply in a workplace. Would love to see a rugby league game where players are not allowed to be within 1.5 meters of each other.

Like I’ve said previously governments will only listen to health officials when it suits them. Just like listening to scientists on climate change when it suits them.

[Boddo]

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/news/coronavirus-vaccine-could-be-ready-by-september-flmwl257x

When will MSM report this? Or will they continue with the fear campaign of 12-18 months

Life will get back normal quicker than we realise.

We will get an AFL season this year.

In theory if you isolate every staff member and family in an isolated community hub there is no reason you can’t run a season.

As an example if SA became virus free and locked off its borders with quarantine of incoming goods and people coming to the state, basically shutting themselves off from the rest of the country, why should they continue to have isolation restrictions? They shouldn’t. So in theory the exact same thing happens for sports. It’s why Dana White has obtained the use of a private island for UFC.

[KTigers]

I think there is a bit of difference between "a vaccine could be ready by September" and "a vaccine will be ready by September".
The large variance in dates being bandied about for a vaccine being "ready" suggests no one really knows. Then there is the issue of actually
distributing a vaccine and the inevitable squabble about who is going to pay for it. I also think even if the number of infections
and deaths in Australia continues to be quite low compared to other countries and the current restrictions are eased, a lot of
people are going to be very cautious and won't be exactly throwing themselves back into their old life for quite awhile. Any
business that has any kind of interaction with the rest of the world (ie a real lot of them) will still be unable to resume normal
service even though Scomo or whoever says everything is now going OK in Australia. The only sense we are an island is
geographically.

[Boddo]

I think there is a bit of difference between "a vaccine could be ready by September" and "a vaccine will be ready by September".
The large variance in dates being bandied about for a vaccine being "ready" suggests no one really knows. Then there is the issue of actually
distributing a vaccine and the inevitable squabble about who is going to pay for it. I also think even if the number of infections
and deaths in Australia continues to be quite low compared to other countries and the current restrictions are eased, a lot of
people are going to be very cautious and won't be exactly throwing themselves back into their old life for quite awhile. Any
business that has any kind of interaction with the rest of the world (ie a real lot of them) will still be unable to resume normal
service even though Scomo or whoever says everything is now going OK in Australia. The only sense we are an island is
geographically.

It’s no different to the 12-18 month that you hear regularly. Most vaccines take years to develop not 18 months. But they could be developed in 12-18 months. So this vaccine could be developed by September. And just like with every vaccine/cure/treatment being studied atm they will produce the drug as they do the human trials. The same as what the Queensland uni will be doing with their trials. allowing for a shorter time span for it to made available to the public.

If one year ago people said the FDA & TGA would approve the use of hydroxychloroquine in an acute hospital setting for a virus it was never intended for with very minimal study you’d be laughed out of the room and here we are right now with this exact thing happening.

All avenues will be used to get a treatment/vaccine ASAP. And I’ll bet London to a brick we ain’t sitting here in 15 months waiting for a vaccine.

When you have the majority of the population basically living off short term government handouts I’ll bet when that runs out they’ll be scrambling as fast as they can to earn a living whether that be in a very well 1.5m distanced place of employment or not. Because by the time those handouts disappear Coronavirus will be the last thing on their mind.

[Boddo]

I’ll add that I wouldn’t be suggesting the season recommence if the data didn’t back it up.

6,311 Coronavirus Cases in Australia - COVID LIVE

While I very much doubt NSW, Vic or Qld will be in the clear anytime soon. All the figures point to a fantastic outcome for NT, Tas, WA & & SA so far. This leads me to believe if those trends continue there is no reason those states cannot have games played there.

Now I’m not saying start it up in 3 weeks I’m saying June is a big possibility if the AFL want to go down the community hub path.

[barry]

No way there is a vaccine in 18 mths. There isn't even one for 2003 SARS, which is similar.

[Markwebbos]

No way there is a vaccine in 18 mths. There isn't even one for 2003 SARS, which is similar.

Development of a vaccine to SARS stopped due to lack of (private) funds.

https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-care/scientists-were-close-coronavirus-vaccine-years-ago-then-money-dried-n1150091

- - - Updated - - -

I’ll add that I wouldn’t be suggesting the season recommence if the data didn’t back it up.

6,311 Coronavirus Cases in Australia - COVID LIVE

While I very much doubt NSW, Vic or Qld will be in the clear anytime soon. All the figures point to a fantastic outcome for NT, Tas, WA & & SA so far. This leads me to believe if those trends continue there is no reason those states cannot have games played there.

Now I’m not saying start it up in 3 weeks I’m saying June is a big possibility if the AFL want to go down the community hub path.

Not looking so good for TAS now. You’d need to have 6-8 weeks of no new cases, backed up by much more expansive testing before you’d want to consider it.

Realistically July sometime, at the earliest

[Boddo]

Development of a vaccine to SARS stopped due to lack of (private) funds.

https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-care/scientists-were-close-coronavirus-vaccine-years-ago-then-money-dried-n1150091

- - - Updated - - -



Not looking so good for TAS now. You’d need to have 6-8 weeks of no new cases, backed up by much more expansive testing before you’d want to consider it.

Realistically July sometime, at the earliest

You look at the community transmission case in conjunction with testing rates and ICU cases. Most people, I’m not saying you, will look at the total number of cases.


As an example We could have six plane loads from Rome that brings 88 new cases to say the NT. Those people go to hospital and are isolated. No uptake of the virus entering the regular community and no chance of this virus being spread. But the new case figures and MSM’s headline will be “Coronavirus skyrockets in Darwin”. They can be traced, isolated and contained. Community is so much harder to get under control.

Like I said community transmission cases in conjunction with testing rates and ICU is what you look at.

[Boddo]

As for the AFL I’d say that they will plan around the community hub idea with several locations in mind. They’ll have a start date in mind with the idea that if one hub becomes an issue they will use other locations. So if for example they had Perth but the peel region had a major influx of community cases say middle of May they’d move that hub to say Darwin.

ATM It won’t be these are our set in concrete locations n that’s it. If a particular location becomes an issue the whole thing is not shut down.

IMO this will be done with PR in mind just like Dana White said he had everything set to go but his broadcasters didn’t like the idea of going ahead while the US Is in such a bad state atm. So he’s postponed. But it will go ahead sooner rather than later.

So it also depends which which headline MSM goes with “People are dieing and we play footy” or “we’re slowly winning, footy returns June 1”.

[Ludwig]

It's interesting to compare the way the respective governments of Australia and Thailand are dealing with Covid. Overall, Thailand has about a tenth of the case rate as Australia and similar restrictions. It's hard to track because Thailand has 77 provinces with similar local powers as the states in Australia, so there are differences from province to province.

My home province of Chiang Rai is allowing their residents back to the province with a forced self isolation of 2 weeks, but is one of 17 provinces that is prohibiting people leaving the province. Chiang Rai has only 9 cases which hasn't changed for a week.

I am still 'stuck' in the most stringent lockdown in Thailand on the island (province) of Phuket, which has a total of 170 cases, but he highest rate of any province in Thailand, about the same rate as NSW.

We just started today a strict lockdown which limits movement outside our subdistrict, which is a bout 50 skm, perhaps the largest on Phuket. The lockdown is in effect for 2 weeks, when the plan is for officials o visit every household on the island of a population of over 400,000 people to check the health of every one the island. This is not a covid test, but rather a fever and general health test and information about contacts. The police intend to do contact tracing on all suspicious cases.

There is a general national lockdown until 30 April. Songkran, which starts today and similar to Easter, has been officially cancelled until an unspecified later date.

There has been a massive hit on the Thai economy, which must be comparatively worse than in Australia. There are so many people connected with the tourist industry which is totally shut down. The myriad small shops and food stands are either shut down or suffering badly. The government is providing financial relief to many of those with lost incomes, but the system is hard pressed. Probably things haven't changed much for the large peasant farming population, although many now depend on family members to work in the larger economy to provide additional income.

There have been mistakes along the way, as in most countries, but I feel Thailand is doing a pretty good job controlling the virus spread. The Thai are gregarious people and it's hard to say how long a lockdown can stick if it goes beyond the end of the month. But when I go food shopping, there's not 1 person without a mask, and about half wear gloves. There is hand sanitizer at groceries, pharmacies and shopping centres.

I'm targeting 4 May to start the 3 day drive back to Chiang Rai, but skeptical that restrictions will be lifted enough to do it by then. We will have to pass through 18 provinces, all with at least 1 checkpoint, which we will have to negotiation without falling under some forced isolation order.

It's hard to see sports being played in from of a live crowd for some time to come. Certainly not this year. Even next year would be in jeopardy without a widely available vaccine.

PS: My brother in law is out of hospital and along with my sister has recovered from Covid in Florida. They will have to have 2 negative Covid tests a week apart before they are allowed to leave.