Humanitarian & business pressures on capacity-limited MIQ are extreme; Endless elimination means perma-lockdown, few MIQ spots & full flight suspensions; Only question on re-opening is when is safest
I really like that you're opening this up for hopefully 'civilised' discussion. While we might need to start having a conversation about reconnecting with the rest of the world, let's not kid ourselves that it is going to be anytime soon. And while your clarification on personally not expecting that to be until mid 2022 at the earliest is welcome, it wasn't well articulate yesterday. Perhaps your blowback is because of the timing of your discussion point. Really you could have waited for a less intense period to be calling for these discussions. Waiting 2 weeks wouldn't have hurt the debate, it might have made it more reasoned. So yes, from my perspective your call yesterday seemed a little too opportunistic. I'm sure you've read the great article in The Spin Off this morning from an ICU perspective. Also a great link included in this to a Science Article on the possible future mutations of the virus. https://thespinoff.co.nz/society/23-08-2021/if-you-listen-closely-enough-you-can-hear-the-whole-system-shudder/
My sense is that you and the government are actually on the same page. But of course the government has to message this in a way that supports current strategy of elimination. Signalling the new strategy too early is likely to undermine the team's current effort to get rid of the Auckland cluster.
You’re an economist you must know it doesn’t suit the many but only the few and is not fit for purpose surely? As for the MIQ issue they can be built for purpose and if unaffordable (it’s not) put it out to private providers. We have wiped out diseases before polio and the like, we have all had to have vaccines to travel or just here before. The point is vaccines won’t wipe this out on its own. So MIQ matters and to service demand will need expanding. With TB people were isolated and the public health system did that. How did Government become so incompetent? NZ collective values dont align with the just let it rip idealogy and think it is an idealogy lacking in courage or persistence and resistance. It’s a throw your hands up in the air and give up approach while most are determined and sacrificing to beat this Government giving up is our biggest risk. We can use the Reserve bank and Sovereign and other wealth funds to rebuild health, education and infrastructure, local manufacturing and supplies and redistribute wealth more humanely while the rest of the world burns in one way or another. A failure of nerve is the only barrier and that will lead us all into a dependent, brutal,extractive and destructive future and we were well along sleepwalking that path anyway. Like any crisis this one comes with opportunity to carve our own future if only Government would behave like mature adults instead of not coping with the task at hand putting their own needs first narcissists. They are paid to serve NZ and the NZ law abiding citizenry. No one else and anything else is perverse and corrupt.Which we see all over the world.
I think the real point is that NZ can't 'eliminate' COVID on its own, and for all our advantages of geographic isolation we can't simply shut ourselves off from the world and weather a storm which is not going to go away. Hysterical hyperbole like 'watching the world burn' isn't particularly helpful, or a very admirable hill to die on - in my opinion. We don't have that luxury, we never did and never will.
You're free to feel that way, but when push comes to shove I have a strong suspicion that you'll find yourself without much support in the public at large - and if it is so, will you 'be kind', or meanly curse the heresy of your fellow NZers who according to you don't uphold so-called and supposed 'NZ collective values'?
You’re an economist you must know it doesn’t suit the many but only the few and is not fit for purpose surely? As for the MIQ issue they can be built for purpose and if unaffordable (it’s not) put it out to private providers. We have wiped out diseases before polio and the like, we have all had to have vaccines to travel or just here before. The point is vaccines won’t wipe this out on its own. So MIQ matters and to service demand will need expanding. With TB people were isolated and the public health system did that. How did Government become so incompetent? NZ collective values dont align with the just let it rip idealogy and think it is an idealogy lacking in courage or persistence and resistance. It’s a throw your hands up in the air and give up approach while most are determined and sacrificing to beat this Government giving up is our biggest risk. We can use the Reserve bank and Sovereign and other wealth funds to rebuild health, education and infrastructure, local manufacturing and supplies and redistribute wealth more humanely while the rest of the world burns in one way or another. A failure of nerve is the only barrier and that will lead us all into a dependent, brutal,extractive and destructive future and we were well along sleepwalking that path anyway. Like any crisis this one comes with opportunity to carve our own future if only Government would behave like mature adults instead of not coping with the task at hand putting their own needs first narcissists. They are paid to serve NZ and the NZ law abiding citizenry. No one else and anything else is perverse and corrupt.Which we see all over the world.
Is there any indication that the government is working on significantly improving our public health infrastructure to the extent required?
All I see is our nurses still haven't got a satisfactory deal from the government, and it seems to me that keeping the workforce happy (and public healthcare careers incentivized) should be a simple first step!
I'm not sure that it's possible to increase Is ICU capacity 'to the extent required'. Many other countries with double or triple our capacity (and higher vaxx rates) are also being overwhelmed. Meanwhile, the more we spend at the very expensive end (ICU) the less we have for preventative health care, unless we're talking about seriously raising taxes).
This is an important discussion to have, well done. I have huge sympathy for the emotional reaction to your analysis, but the facts are clear. We have a series of bad choices ahead, all of which bear a significant cost. Somehow the least-bad choice must be made. Opening up clear eyed, well informed debate on this issue is essential.
So I haven't bothered timing it but the time you spent talking about how terrible missing funerals/weddings/etc is due to a lack of MIQ spots is one of those arguments which makes me extremely suspicious of the motives of a person presenting it.
You are presenting this like there isn't an extremely obvious downside that by letting covid in to run wild you will be directly causing more funerals to occur, potentially thousands of times as many as the admittedly sad cases of people wanting to visit dying relatives at the border.
The moral calculus is not difficult, so this kind of argument seems disingenuous.
Additionally, I'm sure you have seen that overseas, persistent low level restrictions have little ability to mitigate the spread of delta, and are extremely punishing to maintain for long periods. Vastly more than relatively short lock-downs then a return to large levels of freedom.
Where are the arguments about how we could expand MIQ with purpose built facilities. Or are we back to that old chestnut that the government isn't capable of doing something like that?
Thanks. The govt has repeatedly said there are not the staff or facilities. I think the main restraint is the limiting the total number coming in reduces the risks of a breakout. That’s the guts of the problem of only relying on elimination. As COVID gets more infectious and it’s now clear vaccination doesn’t stop the spread, MIQ will be restricted for ever. You also say that a short and sharp lockdown will be followed by months of freedom. I doubt that, given Auckland is likely to be at level 4 for at least another month. And remember, any breach requires a couple of months of lockdown at level 4 every time. That’s the problem. We don’t have high enough vaccination rates or good enough ICUs to do anything but staying closed until 90%. But everyone needs to understand that means level 3/4 until we get there. That’s another year away.
You write: "the already large social wellbeing and mental health pain of ongoing lockdowns, extreme social distancing, missed funerals, births and weddings"
NZ's elimination strategy has allowed us a pretty unique situation in that people living within New Zealand have seen very little in terms of restrictions for these significant family events (unless they were unlucky enough to coincide with a lockdown). However, for the families which are split across countries, from a climate change point of view that sort of travel is going to have to dramatically reduce anyway if we're serious about meeting our warming goals. At some point we will have to accept that migrating means not seeing your family whenever you want to, and that doing so will be expensive, possibly time consuming, and inconvenient.
This is a similar debate to the climate one in that it makes it very clear how unwilling the median voter is to accept significant ongoing changes in their behaviour. Which frankly doesn't inspire a lot of confidence in the outcomes of either debate.
I disagree that a dollar figure isn’t put on a life. It is all the time and by the Government and businesses. Currently the amount spent on criminals is more than women and children per annum for example.Some lives are considered worth less than others. Don’t take it personally you got your answer to your proposal. It will be no less upsetting when our friends and family dying and being ill long term here. And which needs costing and assessing if this argument is attempted I don’t think we have the capacity so we too will have people suffering and dying at home. Unnecessarily frankly. Get those dedicated purpose built MIQs expanded and up and running. It’s long overdue. Like housing and funding etc programmes etc etc.
I think people in government and the media area bit guilty of getting lost in their echo chambers in the best of times, and it's nice to see that at least some of our professional bloviators have their fingers on the pulse of simmering discontent and frustration with a policy setting and national direction which looks more and more like futile hubris with each passing month.
People in my orbit are just fed-up, we don't want to be thanked, we don't want to hear about the day's record vaccinations (I will be fully vaccinated in approximately three months - apparently that's the best they can do, I'm 40), we're sick of the same old 'team of five million' and 'be kind' patronizing platitudes - we want to hear the exit strategy, yesterday. Elimination has failed, each passing day makes it ever clearer; even if this outbreak is contained (fingers crossed), we can't keep this up forever, and all the condescending, guilt-tripping finger-wagging in the world will not put the COVID genie back in the bottle.
Forget statistically dubious self-selecting Facebook polls - the proof of the pudding is in the carelessness with which we all let this happen: the packed stadiums, the obviously unwell people wandering around busy malls who can't even cover their mouths let alone wear a mask out of courtesy. I live in Auckland, I've seen it. I've talked to business owners who've been treading water for a year and more now, and this yo-yoing series of lockdowns isn't sustainable ... people I know are seriously considering leaving NZ altogether because they don't see a future for themselves in some weird kind of dubiously liberal pariah state. I am too. We're not out there with Billy TK ranting about kooky conspiracies, we care about each other and want to do what's best, but we need to see an entirely new vision for 2022 - on this Ardern and Bloomfield seem to be losing the plot. I know I'm just about ready to take my chances with the virus - with the vaccination, of course, and I know it isn't my fault I don't have it yet. I'm not sure I can take three months of this.
Also I'm struck by the bargaining people are engaged in and their unwillingness to realise things will never be the same again... and that somehow allowing Covid to circulate once we hit 80% adult vaccinations will bring us a step further to that old world of 2019. One can only say it's anxiety induced madness or deeply flawed wishful (or wilfully blind) thinking. I feel deeply sympathetic to the plight of people stuck in these thought patterns, it must be an anxious place to be. We all need to re-examine our expectations about what constitutes 'normal life' beyond just this blip in time of a lockdown (hopefully our collective effort will result in this lockdown not lasting 3 months btw.) There are some hard truths we all need to come to terms with when it comes to both covid and especially climate. And yes the process of coming to terms with it is gut wrenching, what I expect it would feel like to have a terminal diagnosis, although that may be me being melodramatic. Either way, Covid is a trial run of what is to come and being in denial of what is to be done and what is to be sacrificed won't save us from the reality that awaits us. This thought piece below articulates it better than me, worth reading. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/aug/11/no-getting-back-to-normal-climate-breakdown-ipcc-report
You're being outrageously, and ironically hysterical ... 'anxiety induced madness'?! With all due respect: tone it back, engage with people more temperately, or they will simply tune you out. This is reasoned debate - I'm 110% with you on the climate 'thing' but it's just not topically relevant to the debate at-hand (other than ironically - because nothing would help the climate situation more directly than a mass de-population of the planet). Bin the incoherent strawmen please - this crisis is real, but it's not as novel as you seem to suppose.
Your brand of Chicken Littleing has worn ever so thin. You can condescend all you like in the name of community, but one surely wonders how gracefully you might accept defeat, as it were.
And like all internet conversations, they devolve into snark and exclamation marks. I was being sincere, perhaps it was lost in translation or clouded by your preconceived notions of what I was saying. Trust me, we'd probably have a good old chat if it was in person. Alas that will never happen.
I'm not trying to have to have a so-called 'internet conversation' (with you, at least - no offense), but what choice do I have, eh?
I do hope that, if you're sincere, that you might forgive me for perceiving your choice of words as intemperate and disrespectful, not just toward me, but also my friends and family - and, if I'm perfectly frank, I strongly doubt that we would have a 'good old chat' in person if we met, because I find your tone almost intolerably condescending and irritating.
I do conceded that my initial comment was a bit condescending, sorry. It was an immature 'smart-arse' response to your immature comment about being 'fed-up' and that you feel patronised by the PM for words like 'be kind'.
Anyway, aside from that I am 100% sincere about being concerned on the mental wellbeing of people who are struggling to accepting the old world is gone.
And despite the fact that you find me intolerably irritating, I still think we'd have a good chat :) Democracy thrives on sharing and debating ideas. It'd just be nice if we had better forums for it than online threads.
You can't even reasonably apologize for your childish, petty quibbling without making it a jab at me and my words that were not directed at you, and which you were not invited by me to express your opinions of. And yet you think we can have a 'good chat'? No. You're insufferable - you want better forums? You need house-training first...
There’s an estimated 750,000 to 1 million New Zealanders living overseas – 17-20%, roughly 1 in 5 – who largely cannot return home because NZ’s borders are so tightly closed and the MIQ booking procedure is flawed – famous sportspeople can book MIQ places but many sick, dying and desperate New Zealanders living overseas can’t, and many people in NZ who need to leave can’t book MIQ places for when they return.
Locking borders means locking these Kiwis out from seeing and caring for elderly, sick and dying children, parents and family, providing emotional support, and more.
No need to defend yourself Bernard! The NZ Government, whether they intended to or not, have created a culture of fear regarding COVID 19. As a result the NZ public have developed a zero risk appetite towards the virus - as shown by the tone of the comments you have received. Being effectively a closed border country living in and out of lockdowns is not a long term post vaccine rollout strategy. This is a debate that isn’t going to go away
Your are saying all good. We can’t stay hiding under the rock. Virus will come here and people will get infected. It is what is it. No comments on this. ‘Fittest of the survival’
We need to get a vaccine approved for children. It is possible as we already have lots of childhood vaccinations now. The argument kids don't get Covid and / or if they do it doesnt affect them much is weakening by the day. Once everyone has had the opportunity to be vaccinated we must open up as there is no longer a justification not to. Opening should be possible within 3 months based on vaccination rates of 50k per day with 1m already having had 2 doses and a population of 5.5m. Those who place a bet on not being vaccinated and avoiding the virus have to live, and die, with the consequences of their decisions.
Individual freedoms should only be suppressed in favour of the group good as long as the group has no alternative. Call me selfish if you like but my choice to travel isn't forever less important than your choice to not have a vaccine. NZ can not remain locked away from the world as a hermit kingdom because a group of people refuse to protect themselves.
<i>delta means stopping a leakage from MIQ is impossible for any length of time, unless MIQ and the number of incoming flights is further reduced in size (it’s amazing it hasn’t happened before now);</i>
Nope, NOT impossible "for any length of time". What is impossible is preventing it from occasionally breaking in. Your choice of words here is in conflict with your second point. Nor are changes to the MIQ process and facilities to make the breakage less frequent impossible. YOU are giving up for some reason. I think it is a mistake.
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<i>delta means occasional full suspensions of international flights (proposed in recent days by the Otago epidemiologists), suspensions and closures of MIQ places (seen last night by MBIE and with the Crowne Plaza’s closure admitted this morning);</i>
Yes it does. This does not make it impossible, it makes it inconvenient to travel overseas.
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<i>the already large social wellbeing and mental health pain of ongoing lockdowns, extreme social distancing, missed funerals, births and weddings must at some point be weighed against the risk and potential pain of hospitalisations and deaths of those unable to be vaccinated; </i>
Apart from about the last 100 years, all of human history has contained the large "social wellbeing and mental health pain" of missed funerals, births and weddings. When Great Grandpa headed to the US from Sweden he said good-bye. Apart from a couple of letters, he was disconnected from his former life. That separation is not unbearable nor is it unnecessary.
Matter of fact we'd better get used to it because if you think COVID is inconvenient you don't want to even THINK about what climate destabilization is about to do to us.
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<i>businesses needing to directly deal with suppliers, buyers and investors have to have a pathway to rejoining the world physically and meaningfully.</i>
Actually, they have a path, it is simply inconvenient. Travelling is going to require a bit more time investment and we're going to have to get better at telepresence but the fact is that the coming disruptions to business due to climate destabilization are going to make the hit from COVID look like a love tap. Some of our trading partners could cease to exist as organized societies. Some of our dependencies may well turn into severe liabilities. We have a 2000 nm moat that we've been bridging with fossil fuels. When we can't use them it's going to seem a lot larger than it seems to us today.
I crunched a few numbers on this. We all know that opening up will mean that some more people will die, let's try to figure out how many, so we can compare to other things that people die of currently.
Let's use the UK, which has a fairly highly vaccinated population, and has decided to remove restrictions. According to https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/aug/24/covid-claims-100-lives-a-day-on-average-across-the-uk-statistics-show, they're running at about 100 deaths per day. This number is likely to be low long term, since currently it's summer there and schools and universities are on break, but let's go with it. 100 a day is 36,500 a year. Adjusting that for population size, if we were at the same rates, 2,758 people would die here per year, about 53 a week.
According to https://www.health.govt.nz/publication/mortality-web-tool, the leading causes of death in 2018 were cancer, ischaemic heart diseases and cerebrovascular diseases. For Maori, the third most common is chronic lower respiratory diseases. Here are the stats on those for 2018, the most recent I could find:
All cancer: 9818
Ischaemic heart diseases: 4674
Cerebrovascular diseases: 2390
Chronic lower respiratory diseases: 1813
So COVID would pretty comfortably be our third most common cause of death, even assuming that our health system were brought up to their level. Is that ok? Maybe, it depends who you ask I suspect. But we should at least be clear what we're talking about.
But anyway, I was mostly trying to get a feeling for myself for the scale of what we're talking about. For example, I've seen people online saying things like: we don't stop people driving even though they die on the roads. If my back-of-the-napkin calculations are anywhere near accurate, the scale is quite different. Of course, it's possible that we could do better than the UK is currently (e.g. by not opening the border up totally and having different categories as Skegg suggested), and it may also be that over time deaths go down as more of the population catches it and gets better immunity. It's too early to tell overseas if that will happen, and I'm no epidemiologist.
I really like that you're opening this up for hopefully 'civilised' discussion. While we might need to start having a conversation about reconnecting with the rest of the world, let's not kid ourselves that it is going to be anytime soon. And while your clarification on personally not expecting that to be until mid 2022 at the earliest is welcome, it wasn't well articulate yesterday. Perhaps your blowback is because of the timing of your discussion point. Really you could have waited for a less intense period to be calling for these discussions. Waiting 2 weeks wouldn't have hurt the debate, it might have made it more reasoned. So yes, from my perspective your call yesterday seemed a little too opportunistic. I'm sure you've read the great article in The Spin Off this morning from an ICU perspective. Also a great link included in this to a Science Article on the possible future mutations of the virus. https://thespinoff.co.nz/society/23-08-2021/if-you-listen-closely-enough-you-can-hear-the-whole-system-shudder/
And finally this from Behavioural Scientist highlights the 'failure of fear' in western cultures during the pandemic. NZ gets a mention on how a 'loose' western culture can mobilise and make collective sacrifices. That should be something to be extremely proud of. Also worth considering when calling for the end of elimination. https://behavioralscientist.org/a-failure-of-fear-why-certain-nations-flunked-the-covid-19-threat-test-tight-loose-cultures/
My sense is that you and the government are actually on the same page. But of course the government has to message this in a way that supports current strategy of elimination. Signalling the new strategy too early is likely to undermine the team's current effort to get rid of the Auckland cluster.
You’re an economist you must know it doesn’t suit the many but only the few and is not fit for purpose surely? As for the MIQ issue they can be built for purpose and if unaffordable (it’s not) put it out to private providers. We have wiped out diseases before polio and the like, we have all had to have vaccines to travel or just here before. The point is vaccines won’t wipe this out on its own. So MIQ matters and to service demand will need expanding. With TB people were isolated and the public health system did that. How did Government become so incompetent? NZ collective values dont align with the just let it rip idealogy and think it is an idealogy lacking in courage or persistence and resistance. It’s a throw your hands up in the air and give up approach while most are determined and sacrificing to beat this Government giving up is our biggest risk. We can use the Reserve bank and Sovereign and other wealth funds to rebuild health, education and infrastructure, local manufacturing and supplies and redistribute wealth more humanely while the rest of the world burns in one way or another. A failure of nerve is the only barrier and that will lead us all into a dependent, brutal,extractive and destructive future and we were well along sleepwalking that path anyway. Like any crisis this one comes with opportunity to carve our own future if only Government would behave like mature adults instead of not coping with the task at hand putting their own needs first narcissists. They are paid to serve NZ and the NZ law abiding citizenry. No one else and anything else is perverse and corrupt.Which we see all over the world.
I think the real point is that NZ can't 'eliminate' COVID on its own, and for all our advantages of geographic isolation we can't simply shut ourselves off from the world and weather a storm which is not going to go away. Hysterical hyperbole like 'watching the world burn' isn't particularly helpful, or a very admirable hill to die on - in my opinion. We don't have that luxury, we never did and never will.
You're free to feel that way, but when push comes to shove I have a strong suspicion that you'll find yourself without much support in the public at large - and if it is so, will you 'be kind', or meanly curse the heresy of your fellow NZers who according to you don't uphold so-called and supposed 'NZ collective values'?
You’re an economist you must know it doesn’t suit the many but only the few and is not fit for purpose surely? As for the MIQ issue they can be built for purpose and if unaffordable (it’s not) put it out to private providers. We have wiped out diseases before polio and the like, we have all had to have vaccines to travel or just here before. The point is vaccines won’t wipe this out on its own. So MIQ matters and to service demand will need expanding. With TB people were isolated and the public health system did that. How did Government become so incompetent? NZ collective values dont align with the just let it rip idealogy and think it is an idealogy lacking in courage or persistence and resistance. It’s a throw your hands up in the air and give up approach while most are determined and sacrificing to beat this Government giving up is our biggest risk. We can use the Reserve bank and Sovereign and other wealth funds to rebuild health, education and infrastructure, local manufacturing and supplies and redistribute wealth more humanely while the rest of the world burns in one way or another. A failure of nerve is the only barrier and that will lead us all into a dependent, brutal,extractive and destructive future and we were well along sleepwalking that path anyway. Like any crisis this one comes with opportunity to carve our own future if only Government would behave like mature adults instead of not coping with the task at hand putting their own needs first narcissists. They are paid to serve NZ and the NZ law abiding citizenry. No one else and anything else is perverse and corrupt.Which we see all over the world.
Is there any indication that the government is working on significantly improving our public health infrastructure to the extent required?
All I see is our nurses still haven't got a satisfactory deal from the government, and it seems to me that keeping the workforce happy (and public healthcare careers incentivized) should be a simple first step!
ICU beds have not increased.
I'm not sure that it's possible to increase Is ICU capacity 'to the extent required'. Many other countries with double or triple our capacity (and higher vaxx rates) are also being overwhelmed. Meanwhile, the more we spend at the very expensive end (ICU) the less we have for preventative health care, unless we're talking about seriously raising taxes).
This is an important discussion to have, well done. I have huge sympathy for the emotional reaction to your analysis, but the facts are clear. We have a series of bad choices ahead, all of which bear a significant cost. Somehow the least-bad choice must be made. Opening up clear eyed, well informed debate on this issue is essential.
So I haven't bothered timing it but the time you spent talking about how terrible missing funerals/weddings/etc is due to a lack of MIQ spots is one of those arguments which makes me extremely suspicious of the motives of a person presenting it.
You are presenting this like there isn't an extremely obvious downside that by letting covid in to run wild you will be directly causing more funerals to occur, potentially thousands of times as many as the admittedly sad cases of people wanting to visit dying relatives at the border.
The moral calculus is not difficult, so this kind of argument seems disingenuous.
Additionally, I'm sure you have seen that overseas, persistent low level restrictions have little ability to mitigate the spread of delta, and are extremely punishing to maintain for long periods. Vastly more than relatively short lock-downs then a return to large levels of freedom.
Where are the arguments about how we could expand MIQ with purpose built facilities. Or are we back to that old chestnut that the government isn't capable of doing something like that?
Thanks. The govt has repeatedly said there are not the staff or facilities. I think the main restraint is the limiting the total number coming in reduces the risks of a breakout. That’s the guts of the problem of only relying on elimination. As COVID gets more infectious and it’s now clear vaccination doesn’t stop the spread, MIQ will be restricted for ever. You also say that a short and sharp lockdown will be followed by months of freedom. I doubt that, given Auckland is likely to be at level 4 for at least another month. And remember, any breach requires a couple of months of lockdown at level 4 every time. That’s the problem. We don’t have high enough vaccination rates or good enough ICUs to do anything but staying closed until 90%. But everyone needs to understand that means level 3/4 until we get there. That’s another year away.
You write: "the already large social wellbeing and mental health pain of ongoing lockdowns, extreme social distancing, missed funerals, births and weddings"
NZ's elimination strategy has allowed us a pretty unique situation in that people living within New Zealand have seen very little in terms of restrictions for these significant family events (unless they were unlucky enough to coincide with a lockdown). However, for the families which are split across countries, from a climate change point of view that sort of travel is going to have to dramatically reduce anyway if we're serious about meeting our warming goals. At some point we will have to accept that migrating means not seeing your family whenever you want to, and that doing so will be expensive, possibly time consuming, and inconvenient.
This is a similar debate to the climate one in that it makes it very clear how unwilling the median voter is to accept significant ongoing changes in their behaviour. Which frankly doesn't inspire a lot of confidence in the outcomes of either debate.
Wow stone cold
I disagree that a dollar figure isn’t put on a life. It is all the time and by the Government and businesses. Currently the amount spent on criminals is more than women and children per annum for example.Some lives are considered worth less than others. Don’t take it personally you got your answer to your proposal. It will be no less upsetting when our friends and family dying and being ill long term here. And which needs costing and assessing if this argument is attempted I don’t think we have the capacity so we too will have people suffering and dying at home. Unnecessarily frankly. Get those dedicated purpose built MIQs expanded and up and running. It’s long overdue. Like housing and funding etc programmes etc etc.
I think people in government and the media area bit guilty of getting lost in their echo chambers in the best of times, and it's nice to see that at least some of our professional bloviators have their fingers on the pulse of simmering discontent and frustration with a policy setting and national direction which looks more and more like futile hubris with each passing month.
People in my orbit are just fed-up, we don't want to be thanked, we don't want to hear about the day's record vaccinations (I will be fully vaccinated in approximately three months - apparently that's the best they can do, I'm 40), we're sick of the same old 'team of five million' and 'be kind' patronizing platitudes - we want to hear the exit strategy, yesterday. Elimination has failed, each passing day makes it ever clearer; even if this outbreak is contained (fingers crossed), we can't keep this up forever, and all the condescending, guilt-tripping finger-wagging in the world will not put the COVID genie back in the bottle.
Forget statistically dubious self-selecting Facebook polls - the proof of the pudding is in the carelessness with which we all let this happen: the packed stadiums, the obviously unwell people wandering around busy malls who can't even cover their mouths let alone wear a mask out of courtesy. I live in Auckland, I've seen it. I've talked to business owners who've been treading water for a year and more now, and this yo-yoing series of lockdowns isn't sustainable ... people I know are seriously considering leaving NZ altogether because they don't see a future for themselves in some weird kind of dubiously liberal pariah state. I am too. We're not out there with Billy TK ranting about kooky conspiracies, we care about each other and want to do what's best, but we need to see an entirely new vision for 2022 - on this Ardern and Bloomfield seem to be losing the plot. I know I'm just about ready to take my chances with the virus - with the vaccination, of course, and I know it isn't my fault I don't have it yet. I'm not sure I can take three months of this.
Some super fascinating behavioural science research you might find enlightening, perhaps something you and the people in 'your orbit' have yet to consider? Which I shared below earlier too. https://behavioralscientist.org/a-failure-of-fear-why-certain-nations-flunked-the-covid-19-threat-test-tight-loose-cultures/
Also I'm struck by the bargaining people are engaged in and their unwillingness to realise things will never be the same again... and that somehow allowing Covid to circulate once we hit 80% adult vaccinations will bring us a step further to that old world of 2019. One can only say it's anxiety induced madness or deeply flawed wishful (or wilfully blind) thinking. I feel deeply sympathetic to the plight of people stuck in these thought patterns, it must be an anxious place to be. We all need to re-examine our expectations about what constitutes 'normal life' beyond just this blip in time of a lockdown (hopefully our collective effort will result in this lockdown not lasting 3 months btw.) There are some hard truths we all need to come to terms with when it comes to both covid and especially climate. And yes the process of coming to terms with it is gut wrenching, what I expect it would feel like to have a terminal diagnosis, although that may be me being melodramatic. Either way, Covid is a trial run of what is to come and being in denial of what is to be done and what is to be sacrificed won't save us from the reality that awaits us. This thought piece below articulates it better than me, worth reading. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/aug/11/no-getting-back-to-normal-climate-breakdown-ipcc-report
You're being outrageously, and ironically hysterical ... 'anxiety induced madness'?! With all due respect: tone it back, engage with people more temperately, or they will simply tune you out. This is reasoned debate - I'm 110% with you on the climate 'thing' but it's just not topically relevant to the debate at-hand (other than ironically - because nothing would help the climate situation more directly than a mass de-population of the planet). Bin the incoherent strawmen please - this crisis is real, but it's not as novel as you seem to suppose.
Your brand of Chicken Littleing has worn ever so thin. You can condescend all you like in the name of community, but one surely wonders how gracefully you might accept defeat, as it were.
And like all internet conversations, they devolve into snark and exclamation marks. I was being sincere, perhaps it was lost in translation or clouded by your preconceived notions of what I was saying. Trust me, we'd probably have a good old chat if it was in person. Alas that will never happen.
I'm not trying to have to have a so-called 'internet conversation' (with you, at least - no offense), but what choice do I have, eh?
I do hope that, if you're sincere, that you might forgive me for perceiving your choice of words as intemperate and disrespectful, not just toward me, but also my friends and family - and, if I'm perfectly frank, I strongly doubt that we would have a 'good old chat' in person if we met, because I find your tone almost intolerably condescending and irritating.
I do conceded that my initial comment was a bit condescending, sorry. It was an immature 'smart-arse' response to your immature comment about being 'fed-up' and that you feel patronised by the PM for words like 'be kind'.
Anyway, aside from that I am 100% sincere about being concerned on the mental wellbeing of people who are struggling to accepting the old world is gone.
And despite the fact that you find me intolerably irritating, I still think we'd have a good chat :) Democracy thrives on sharing and debating ideas. It'd just be nice if we had better forums for it than online threads.
You can't even reasonably apologize for your childish, petty quibbling without making it a jab at me and my words that were not directed at you, and which you were not invited by me to express your opinions of. And yet you think we can have a 'good chat'? No. You're insufferable - you want better forums? You need house-training first...
There’s an estimated 750,000 to 1 million New Zealanders living overseas – 17-20%, roughly 1 in 5 – who largely cannot return home because NZ’s borders are so tightly closed and the MIQ booking procedure is flawed – famous sportspeople can book MIQ places but many sick, dying and desperate New Zealanders living overseas can’t, and many people in NZ who need to leave can’t book MIQ places for when they return.
Locking borders means locking these Kiwis out from seeing and caring for elderly, sick and dying children, parents and family, providing emotional support, and more.
No need to defend yourself Bernard! The NZ Government, whether they intended to or not, have created a culture of fear regarding COVID 19. As a result the NZ public have developed a zero risk appetite towards the virus - as shown by the tone of the comments you have received. Being effectively a closed border country living in and out of lockdowns is not a long term post vaccine rollout strategy. This is a debate that isn’t going to go away
Your are saying all good. We can’t stay hiding under the rock. Virus will come here and people will get infected. It is what is it. No comments on this. ‘Fittest of the survival’
We need to get a vaccine approved for children. It is possible as we already have lots of childhood vaccinations now. The argument kids don't get Covid and / or if they do it doesnt affect them much is weakening by the day. Once everyone has had the opportunity to be vaccinated we must open up as there is no longer a justification not to. Opening should be possible within 3 months based on vaccination rates of 50k per day with 1m already having had 2 doses and a population of 5.5m. Those who place a bet on not being vaccinated and avoiding the virus have to live, and die, with the consequences of their decisions.
Individual freedoms should only be suppressed in favour of the group good as long as the group has no alternative. Call me selfish if you like but my choice to travel isn't forever less important than your choice to not have a vaccine. NZ can not remain locked away from the world as a hermit kingdom because a group of people refuse to protect themselves.
<i>delta means stopping a leakage from MIQ is impossible for any length of time, unless MIQ and the number of incoming flights is further reduced in size (it’s amazing it hasn’t happened before now);</i>
Nope, NOT impossible "for any length of time". What is impossible is preventing it from occasionally breaking in. Your choice of words here is in conflict with your second point. Nor are changes to the MIQ process and facilities to make the breakage less frequent impossible. YOU are giving up for some reason. I think it is a mistake.
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<i>delta means occasional full suspensions of international flights (proposed in recent days by the Otago epidemiologists), suspensions and closures of MIQ places (seen last night by MBIE and with the Crowne Plaza’s closure admitted this morning);</i>
Yes it does. This does not make it impossible, it makes it inconvenient to travel overseas.
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<i>the already large social wellbeing and mental health pain of ongoing lockdowns, extreme social distancing, missed funerals, births and weddings must at some point be weighed against the risk and potential pain of hospitalisations and deaths of those unable to be vaccinated; </i>
Apart from about the last 100 years, all of human history has contained the large "social wellbeing and mental health pain" of missed funerals, births and weddings. When Great Grandpa headed to the US from Sweden he said good-bye. Apart from a couple of letters, he was disconnected from his former life. That separation is not unbearable nor is it unnecessary.
Matter of fact we'd better get used to it because if you think COVID is inconvenient you don't want to even THINK about what climate destabilization is about to do to us.
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<i>businesses needing to directly deal with suppliers, buyers and investors have to have a pathway to rejoining the world physically and meaningfully.</i>
Actually, they have a path, it is simply inconvenient. Travelling is going to require a bit more time investment and we're going to have to get better at telepresence but the fact is that the coming disruptions to business due to climate destabilization are going to make the hit from COVID look like a love tap. Some of our trading partners could cease to exist as organized societies. Some of our dependencies may well turn into severe liabilities. We have a 2000 nm moat that we've been bridging with fossil fuels. When we can't use them it's going to seem a lot larger than it seems to us today.
There has to be a way to format these comments. How the heck can a long-form medium be viable if it hasn't got that?
I crunched a few numbers on this. We all know that opening up will mean that some more people will die, let's try to figure out how many, so we can compare to other things that people die of currently.
Let's use the UK, which has a fairly highly vaccinated population, and has decided to remove restrictions. According to https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/aug/24/covid-claims-100-lives-a-day-on-average-across-the-uk-statistics-show, they're running at about 100 deaths per day. This number is likely to be low long term, since currently it's summer there and schools and universities are on break, but let's go with it. 100 a day is 36,500 a year. Adjusting that for population size, if we were at the same rates, 2,758 people would die here per year, about 53 a week.
How does that compare to other forms of death?
According to https://www.transport.govt.nz/statistics-and-insights/safety-road-deaths/, 339 people died on the roads in the 12 months to now. So COVID would kill over 8 times the number of people that currently die on the roads.
According to https://www.health.govt.nz/publication/mortality-web-tool, the leading causes of death in 2018 were cancer, ischaemic heart diseases and cerebrovascular diseases. For Maori, the third most common is chronic lower respiratory diseases. Here are the stats on those for 2018, the most recent I could find:
All cancer: 9818
Ischaemic heart diseases: 4674
Cerebrovascular diseases: 2390
Chronic lower respiratory diseases: 1813
So COVID would pretty comfortably be our third most common cause of death, even assuming that our health system were brought up to their level. Is that ok? Maybe, it depends who you ask I suspect. But we should at least be clear what we're talking about.
And we don’t lockdown for any other causes of death?
Well, it wouldn't work for any of the big ones.
But anyway, I was mostly trying to get a feeling for myself for the scale of what we're talking about. For example, I've seen people online saying things like: we don't stop people driving even though they die on the roads. If my back-of-the-napkin calculations are anywhere near accurate, the scale is quite different. Of course, it's possible that we could do better than the UK is currently (e.g. by not opening the border up totally and having different categories as Skegg suggested), and it may also be that over time deaths go down as more of the population catches it and gets better immunity. It's too early to tell overseas if that will happen, and I'm no epidemiologist.