Blog Day 136 - Wednesday 18 November 2020 

Victoria is now up to 19 days of zero new infections and zero new deaths.  However, remember that we are not taking any overseas flights and haven't done so for many months so we have no idea if our hotel quarantine is up to scratch or if our new steam powered computerised tracking and tracing system will work if it is put under any sort of stress.  

But lets not allow any practicalities get in the way of presenting Melbourne and Victoria as the sporting capital of the world.  As mentioned yesterday Tennis Australia is still spruiking that the Australian Open will be played here in January plus all the supporting tournaments that would normally be played in other states will be played here as well.  There is now another issue with the tennis in that given the current virus position in the USA none of the US players will be allowed to travel to Australia to play.  Would that put a spanner in the works?

The Age is reporting today that the Victorian government and department of health have not agreed to or signed off on the arrangements for the AO to proceed on 18 Jan.  There are issues around the players being able to attend practice courts whilst still in quarantine.

Sounds like we are making this up as we go along.

Now for the cricket.  Apparently Cricket Australia has some sort of OK to play the boxing day test against India at the MCG with limited crowds and appropriate crowd management.  It would appear that given the situation in SA CA has suggested the 1st test against India could be played at the MCG if SA is unable to host.  The 1st test is less than a month away.

Remember, we have not had an international flight into Melbourne for months, we have not stress tested the new improved hotel quarantine and we have not stress tested our supposedly upgraded tracking and tracing system.  Which is apparently now "world class", where have we heard this before.

Are we letting our ambitions get beyond our capabilities here?

I know that we have to get as close to covid normal as soon as possible and that a lot of people really look forward to these sporting events but this stuff really worries me. We have previously been advised that our systems have been working perfectly and look what happened, we don't want a repeat of those disasters.

South Australia has announced a 6 day lockdown from midnight tonight.  Schools, restaurants, take away cafes etc closed, one person per household per day allowed out and so on.  This is pretty draconian even by Victorian standards, and we know all about lockdowns.  

As stated above the Victorian figures are looking good with another zero - zero result for the last 24 hours.  The zero - zero figures in Victoria were as the result of testing more than 17,000 people on each of the last two days. This is good news as it means the testing regime is maintaining its momentum.

The national figures for new infections don't quite add up, I think that there must be some sort of delay in reporting the state figures and compiling nationally.  

So, we work with what we have got.  There are 88 active cases Australia wide, with Vic declaring 3 active cases, NSW 20 and SA 34.  It is reported that SA is anticipating 14 new cases to be declared in that state today.  There are 23 people in hospital nationally and 2 of the 3 current Victorian cases are in hospital.

Worldwide there were 622,000 new infections reported in the last 24 hours bringing the worldwide figure to 55,900,000.  There were 11,437 deaths reported which I think would be highest number of deaths in a 24 hour period for the pandemic.  Total number of deaths to date worldwide is 1,342,928.

And we want to bring people in from overseas to play cricket and tennis!

Corona Virus Daily Stats – Towards Covid Normal – 14 day stage – Day 8

Date	Aus Infected	Aus Increase	Vic Infected	Vic Increase	Aus Death	Vic Death	Aus Hospl	Vic Hospital	Aus ICU	Vic ICU
08/11	27,655	3	20,345	0	907	819	19	2	1	0
9/11	27,665	7	20,345	0	907	819	19	2	1	0
10/11	27,678	10	20,345	0	907	819	21	2	0	0
11/11	27,686	8	20,345	0	907	819	21	2	0	0
12/11	27,694	8	20,345	0	907	819	23	2	0	0
13/11	27,702	5	20,345	0	907	819	21	2	0	0
14/11	27,709	6	20,345	0	907	819	26	2	0	0
15/11	27,724	13	20,345	0	907	819	21	2	0	0
16/11	27,745	16	20,345	0	907	818	22	2	0	0
17/11	27,752	2	20345	0	907	819	24	2	0	0
18/11	27,769	9	20,345	0	907	819	23	2	0	0
19/11

Date	World Infection	Daily Increase	World Deaths	Daily Increase
08/11	50,263,739	617,803	1,256,352	8,380
09/11	50,721,774	458,035	1,261,736	5,384
10/11	51,254,740	532,966	1,269,350	7,614
11/11	51,809,844	550,104	1,279,531	10,181
12/11	52,418,061	608,217	1,288,778	9,247
13/11	53,091,981	673,920	1,299,407	10,629
14/11	53,722,973	630,992	1,308,487	9,080
15/11	54,318,729	595,756	1,318,038	9,551
16/11	54,804,194	485,465	1,324,025	5,987
17/11	55,310,487	506,293	1,331,491	7,466
18/11	55,932,688	622,201	1,342,928	11,437
19/11

And now the Towards Covid Normal remembers;

Remember: Keep wearing your mask!; remember to remember Remembrance Day; the price of corona virus liberty is eternal vigilance; enjoy the new found freedoms but not too much, just yet; don't get your tennis racquet out just yet; don't travel to SA; don't count your chickens before they hatch.