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What is the Covid-19 Exit Strategy of 'Zero Covid' countries such as Hong Kong?

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TravelDream

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That sounds like a very poor vaccination programme.
NZ and Aus's vaccination programmes have both been off to slow starts.
I suppose you could argue with no-few local cases there was no urgency.
NZ says they want to start vaccinating under 65s from the start of next month. Oz is a bit further ahead of them.

However, there's something I think lots of people don't realise. Countries first in line have paid more for the vaccines, paid more upfront and also taken a greater risk. There are drawbacks to being first financially.
 
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Domh245

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However, there's something I think lots of people don't realise. Countries first in line have paid more for the vaccines, paid more upfront and also taken a greater risk. There are drawbacks to being first financially.

That's an interesting take on the situation. The big countries who've received the vaccines first were those who funded and supported the various companies in developing and distributing the vaccines - yes some of the vaccines have failed but if nobody steps up the plate then we'd probably still be waiting. Given the astronomical costs of all the NPIs put in place, the vaccines (even accounting for sponsoring development and orders for failed vaccines) seem excellent value
 

Richard Scott

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Perhaps we could look at excess deaths for both countries and see how they compare? Some people seem to have forgotten that we all have to die of something and just because there were few deaths in NZ due to virus doesn't mean they didn't die from something else. At the end of the day average age of a Covid death in UK is around 82 with a life expectancy of 81.
 

Freightmaster

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Nice graph, but would you be kind enough to explain how NZ can ever open up their borders to visitors/tourists
(i.e. no mandatory testing or quarantine) without causing hundreds, if not thousands of deaths - surely you see that??


That doesn't answer the point about them failing to have an exit strategy.

Exactly!

They've painted themselves into a corner where they are morally and epidemically compelled to keep their
borders closed to outsiders for years to come which (thankfully) was never a viable option for the UK or
any other European country.





MARK
 

Bantamzen

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Yeah, "called it wrong". They have no strategy to get out of this situation, they are struggling to get their vaccination programme going (18% 1st, 11% 2nd), they are still all but completely isolated and likely to be so for another year at this rate.

And the virus continues to rumble through their population. For a "zero covid" strategy, I'd definitely say they have called it wrong.
 

MarkyT

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Nice graph, but would you be kind enough to explain how NZ can ever open up their borders to visitors/tourists
(i.e. no mandatory testing or quarantine) without causing hundreds, if not thousands of deaths - surely you see that??




Exactly!

They've painted themselves into a corner where they are morally and epidemically compelled to keep their
borders closed to outsiders for years to come which (thankfully) was never a viable option for the UK or
any other European country.





MARK
Not neccessarily years at all. They have a small population and a well-developed health system and other infrastructure. All they've got to do is acquire sufficient vaccines and organise a campaign to deploy the shots quickly. A few months should do it. Ditto Australia, although clearly a larger population and more distributed, and East Asian countries that employed a similar strategy. Such well educated countries should have a high take-up like Isreal and case rates should not take off. Yes they are constantly having to 'fire-fight' at the moment, but because of competent management the reactive lockdowns are small, and limited in size and duration. Most of the time their domestic economies are back to normal, and have been for months.
 

DustyBin

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Not neccessarily years at all. They have a small population and a well-developed health system and other infrastructure. All they've got to do is acquire sufficient vaccines and organise a campaign to deploy the shots quickly. A few months should do it. Ditto Australia, although clearly a larger population and more distributed, and East Asian countries that employed a similar strategy. Such well educated countries should have a high take-up like Isreal and case rates should not take off. Yes they are constantly having to 'fire-fight' at the moment, but because of competent management the reactive lockdowns are small, and limited in size and duration. Most of the time their domestic economies are back to normal, and have been for months.

I honestly don’t think it will be as easy as that for them. They can vaccinate as many people as they like but that won’t get them to “zero covid”. I also think they’ll be panicked into further lockdowns by doom mongering experts more easily than us (and we still have a long fight ahead in this regard).
 

nlogax

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The NZ government needs to come to terms with Covid returning to its islands. For reasons I don't fully understand NZ's vaccination program has been incredibly slow. Ardern and her government will need to take the required leap of faith to return to normality at some point but from this far off perspective that could be anything from six months to a year away.
 

birchesgreen

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Its slow because richer countries, including ourselves, chucked billions at procuring the vaccine last year. Now more vaccine slots are becoming available i expect NZ to make more rapid progress.
 

Yew

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However, there's something I think lots of people don't realise. Countries first in line have paid more for the vaccines, paid more upfront and also taken a greater risk. There are drawbacks to being first financially.
However when being first enables quicker reopening of your society and economy, it's a cost that will pay itself back many times.
 

TravelDream

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That's an interesting take on the situation. The big countries who've received the vaccines first were those who funded and supported the various companies in developing and distributing the vaccines - yes some of the vaccines have failed but if nobody steps up the plate then we'd probably still be waiting. Given the astronomical costs of all the NPIs put in place, the vaccines (even accounting for sponsoring development and orders for failed vaccines) seem excellent value
I think you are being rather unfair.

I think it's absolutely right that we invested in vaccines and should have invested more and not less given the huge cost of lockdowns.

What I am saying is right though. Some people think we got so many vaccines early because our government was 'better'. Perhaps in a certain sense they were, but it was mainly down to putting bucket loads of money in with the associated risk (just look how much money both we and the US have sunk into GlaxoSmithKline. If you can't be bothered, it's in the billions each).


However when being first enables quicker reopening of your society and economy, it's a cost that will pay itself back many times.
If done well, this is certainly true. Vaccines can even be profit making if they allow you to open up earlier cutting the cost of furlough/ economic support combined with economic growth.
 

Pakenhamtrain

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Some removalists have brought the virus back to victoria and a family who weren't doing the right thing have brought the virus back to Victoria. It's now spreading again.
Two cases even went to the G Saturday for Carlton v Geelong in the MCC.
The removalists seem to not want to talk for some reason.

Fair to say Victorians who are now staring down a 5th lockdown are furious.
 

birchesgreen

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Maybe people should try their smug links before they post them here. Links about removal companies are handy i am sure though not sure the relevance here.
 

TravelDream

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I actually think that's what a removalist is i.e. somebody who works for a removal company. I may be wrong though, maybe

From reading the news article, I would guess this is right. This job definitely isn't referred to as a 'removalist' in this country so it's fair enough to ask.


This link wasn't directed at me, but there's no need to be such a smart alec. Searching Google the first page of results are all for news articles from Australia about the case.

The Cambridge dictionary clearly states it's an Australian English word. https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/removalist
 

Darandio

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So some removal company employees have brought the virus back to Victoria? I'm assuming there is supposed to be limited movement but people are still allowed to move house, therefore it's been brought over the 'border' during this process hence the emphasis on the particular trade?
 

takno

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This link wasn't directed at me, but there's no need to be such a smart alec. Searching Google the first page of results are all for news articles from Australia about the case.
I think a lot of the problem is that people assume that the same thing comes up for different people when they Google stuff. News articles are extremely location-specific, as are any regional terms.
 

birchesgreen

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I see the problem now. The context and 'ist' ending had me looking for some kind of Covid-specific belief or behaviour.
Yeah thats why i don't like those lmgtfy links, as without context its difficult to know what google match i am supposed to be looking at, especially these days with search results being rather poor.
 

Dent

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I think a lot of the problem is that people assume that the same thing comes up for different people when they Google stuff. News articles are extremely location-specific, as are any regional terms.

None of that would be an issue if people were more civil and didn't post such condescending links in the first place.
 

Ediswan

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So some removal company employees have brought the virus back to Victoria? I'm assuming there is supposed to be limited movement but people are still allowed to move house, therefore it's been brought over the 'border' during this process hence the emphasis on the particular trade?
That is my impression. It appears that removalists are exempt from self-isolation rules (Google was helpful there). Any time an exemptions is created, a weakness in the defences is also created.
 

kristiang85

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None of that would be an issue if people were more civil and didn't post such condescending links in the first place.

Yes, it takes just as long to post the link than it does to write a sentence to answer the question...

I thought it was a COVID-specific term at first, given the suffix, but worked out the context in the end. But its a fair question I'd say given it sounds like a slang for someone who wants to remove restrictions/masks (then I am one :D)

It is strange that was allowed to happen though, and the exemption is there, given how strict the border policies in Oz are?
 

westv

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None of that would be an issue if people were more civil and didn't post such condescending links in the first place.
Indeed. If everybody just posted a link telling you to look at Google there wouldn't be much of a forum in the first place.
 
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