I’m noticing there’s a lot less negativity on social media about our elimination strategy as our daily cases fall, as the cluster is contained, and testing/tracing shuts down the outbreak - as it works. “Let it run” means kiss Level 1 goodbye, stress++, more hospital headlines.
Under stress, news headlines point wistfully to (worse) situations overseas, where Level 1 is a dream, deaths are high, Plan B academics in the news again. Let’s acknowledge when the strategy is working. For instance, we could have the UK situation here: bbc.com/news/uk-542219…
Or we could be grappling with similar issues in hard hit Victoria (recognise these?) - where outbreaks amongst essential health workers have (probably) prolonged the necessary duration of the lockdown: smh.com.au/national/victo…
Or perhaps we could be the USA with 200,000 dead, and still no clear plan: nytimes.com/2020/09/20/us/…
Or we could be Singapore, who have done extremely well, with few deaths despite over 50,000 cases (likely due to other factors including excellent healthcare, demographic) - but look how similar the issues are to NZ: straitstimes.com/singapore/heal…
All I’m trying to say is that - when things are going well, because our unique strategy is working - we are still wrestling with the same issues seen elsewhere. We also have a lot to be grateful for, as cases are rising in many countries, including across Europe ahead of winter.
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