AUSTRALIA

CHRISTOPHER QUIRK SCHOOL HOUSE 1974-1980

SYDNEY – JULY 2020

With insight into the health system and family, friends and colleagues over in the UK the Covid Process and management has been if not interesting but also frustrating. Please note, however, that my opinions are not necessarily correct and certainly we have seen multiple different ways of handling this, different approaches and of course we have all changed our views over time as more is learnt. It is also worth noting that in my opinion both New Zealand and Australia have done the best at handling things (so far!). I do acknowledge that our location, Island status and our relative ‘under-population’ has helped. As I am sure you have heard before, “The spread of Covid is dependent on 1. The Density of the population and 2. The density of the Population”

Anyway, how did we cope with it? I felt that we reacted a bit too slowly, initially more fearful of the economy than health. We did close the borders but very loosely, and initially suggesting voluntary isolation for returning people. Of course, society is full of individual selfish people who have not taken things seriously and did not obey. In my opinion the single most important thing we did which saved us, and almost got us to an ‘elimination state’ (as per New Zealand) was to enforce hotel guarded quarantine for two weeks. Beyond that we only had to deal with local transmission.

The second most important thing that was done was immediate financial support for both business and individuals that were impacted. This was actually a very generous amount and meant some people were in fact better off but was certainly the right thing to do (as expected, it was abused by some!).

Very early on in the pandemic, quite rightly the Government and advisors appreciated that going forward the only way of getting on top of things would be quick and accurate tracking of cases and contacts. They quickly developed an app for smart phones that would log anyone who had been in close proximity to you, such that if you tested positive all contacts could be quickly tracked. While this does work, actually what we have seen with the Victoria disaster is that compared with NSW, manual tracking probably works better. This is combined with every public place taking records of all visitors. Indeed, the problems in Victoria have culminated from poor management especially around hotel quarantine and slow tracking. We have also instituted very early widespread testing. As I understand it, none of the above has occurred in the UK!

From the hospital aspect, I strongly believe there is no country in the world that has a better hospital and health system than Australia and I am enormously proud of who our administrators, allied health care workers and my colleagues have prepared and handled the pandemic.

There have been issues lately in other states that are clear results of poor Government. Cutting corners and dare I say some degree of corruptness. We may have gone to almost elimination had it not been for Victoria and in my opinion, I feel a national strategy may have been better rather than leaving things to individual states. We have subsequently had issues with state border closures which where done too slowly and allowed cases to jump over rapidly spreading infection and cases. We have also seen greater difficulty controlling things in light of individual acts of selfish behaviour. Ignoring social isolation is bad enough but going out with symptoms and with a positive Covid-19 test is still going on and quite frankly in my opinion is not been dealt with harshly enough by authorities!!

We did have a lockdown. However, what does that mean? I am sure you are aware of the lockdown in NZ. Ours was no where near like that. Whilst we had restrictions on the number of visitors, only allowed out for essential matters etc, on the whole we did have a degree of freedom and was actually not very restrictive. And yet during that we were still able to keep our numbers down.

OK, now is where another disclaimer comes!! Of course, this has had an enormous impact on my and our lives, but we truly acknowledge how lucky we are and how privileged we have been – I still work, my son still works, and we are happy and safe at home. Yes, my daughter can’t get to Uni, my sons partner is stuck in the UK and can’t get over here and my wife can’t get to UK to visit elderly relatives – but hey, allowing for the people doing it so tough, we can’t complain at all. It’s worth reminding ourselves when people continuously say we are all in it together. Excuse my French, but ‘Boll**ks!’ We may be all in the same storm, but we are all in different boats! In fact, many people we know, and I see from the more affluent parts of society comment how much they have enjoyed the forced isolation, time with family and working from home.

I am not sure a return to normal in the near future is likely, or indeed desirable. This should be the forced change the world needed. Having said that, human nature being what it is we will soon forget and go back to the pre Covid-19 state, but I suspect that will be years and not months. International travel will never return to normal.

I am certainly keen to get back to the way life was, although for me personally it has been an opportunity to revaluate work, and perhaps expedite winding down, including coming back to the UK and spending time there working and catching up with old friends.

On a separate note, I was actively involved with OMs sports after leaving school, and I think the main thing I miss is still being able to do that and maybe have a few more games with them and attend functions – one day!

The Australian government was quick to close the borders and as such was in a good place to contain the virus. They managed to flatten the curve fairly well. However, there was a second wave, which came about because of slack quarantine procedures of residents being repatriated to Australia.

However, I am confident they did a good job under the circumstances, no one really expected anything like this to happen. Looking at other countries and how they’ve handled it I believe they have done well.

Hindsight is a wonderful thing, the NSW government could have handled the disembarkation of the Princes Rose cruise ship a lot better. People who were infected with the virus were basically allowed back into the community even though they were contaigious with Covid-19.

I think better quarantine training for the security guards protecting the International travellers coming home that went into 14 confinement. Also better security and training in the aged care centres where a lot of vulnerable people have lost their lives.

I experienced lock down to a certain extent, however I was allowed to travel to work everyday. Not being able to visit my son and his new baby girl was very tough. They live in New South Wales and the borders are closed into Queensland. In order to visit them I would have to go into quarantine for fourteen days on my return.

My preference would be to return to life before Covid-19, but don’t think it will, there will be changes coming. I’d like to think that things will return to normal next year, however I don’t think life will. There will be a new normal, living with Covid-19.

Thinking about Mill Hill I do miss my old buddies from school and the rugby club, nothing quite like a pint down at Headstone Lane.