It was AFL Grand Final weekend and since 1902 it is a game played the Melbourne Cricket Ground; there are a handful…
of exceptions where the game had to be relocated to other stadiums in Victoria. Thanks to the pandemic last the game was played in Brisbane and this year in Perth; two years – two different states; at least they got a good crowd to see the game between two Victorian teams in Perth, >60,000; . We still got a Grand Final holiday on Friday but not the same vibe while we’re in lockdown with over 700 cases of new COVID cases reported each day.
The AFL Grand final is just one example of how the pandemic has disrupted society. The pain around the city is easy to see – many small and medium-sized businesses have been decimated. In a few days we are due to break the record for the most “lockeddown” city in the world. Have we been too cautious with lockdowns? Was there are better balance? Can anything have been done differently? All these questions will be analysed and answered at the right time, by the right people.
Of course, one thing we could have done better, is a more rapid and aggressive vaccination program. Now, with availability of vaccine there is a great rush to vaccinate as much as possible. Specific “freedoms” have been assigned to vaccination milestones. This is good but unfortunately, a few months too late – this latest lockdown 6.0 should have been avoided; we knew from the experience in India that the delta variant was nasty – should have pushed the vaccination drive harder at that time; we were complacent because we were essentially open with consistent “donut days”.
We are now approaching a time where 80% of the population will have received their first dose of vaccine; ~50% fully vaccinated. This will trigger some freedoms and it is anticipated that many more freedoms will come in the first week of November when ~70% of the population will be fully vaccinated; anticipating an “open” day of sorts in time for Christmas shopping!
Just because 70%-80% of the population will be fully vaccinated, doesn’t mean were safe; we need closer to 90% and hopefully no new, vaccine resistant, variants arise… the problem is that we know now that fully vaccinated people can still get infected – it’s a fact – they do; essentially this makes them incubators for potential vaccine-resistant variants to replicate and spread – complicated topic; we’ll discuss later in detail.
The good news is that vaccinated people are much less likely to present with severe COVID-19 disease; this means we can be more confident that hospital systems will not be overwhelmed and we can go about our business in a more confident way.
Hopefully, we get vaccinated and some of the classics can be re-instated! AFL Grand Final and Boxing Day Test at the “G”, Fun Fridays at Crown (parking is free now – no one needs it J), and face-to-face teaching! Nothing beats the originals – that’s why I like Coca Cola … and I have always liked it a bit better in glass bottles… and more recently I realised that I like Mexican Coke better than all other versions; I think I know why – the original green glass bottle and metal cap … our version has the clear glass and screw cap … still very good … but not the best! Green glass / flip metal cap!
Thankfully, I have shop close by (within my 5km limit) that imports the Mexican version!
Until next time …