Blog Day 158 - Thursday 10 December 2020

Apologies for no blog yesterday, I know that must have been devastating for my many followers.  Anyway, I had a nice day out attending the Shrine volunteer lunch at the town hall and then followed by a couple of beers at Young and Jacksons and then train and bus home.  

It was great to catch up with my fellow volunteers and the staff from the Shrine all of whom I hadn't seen (apart from on zoom) since March.  We look like we could be back on deck at the Shrine from mid January, which will be good.

Another day of zero figures for Victoria.  So far there has been 4 or 5 returning travellers in Victoria (out of about 300) who were showing symptoms of the virus but have tested negative.  I see that Tasmania after a 100 days or so of no infections is now reporting 4 active cases, all recently returned travellers in hotel quarantine in that fair state. 

Australia wide there were 8 new cases reported in each of the last two days, all of these are returned travellers who are in hotel quarantine.  In the last 24 hours there were 4 new cases in NSW, 3 in Qld and 1 in Tasmania.  No new deaths reported in Victoria or Australia wide.  Victoria has zero active cases, NSW 1, Qld 22, WA 13 and Tas 4.  Australia wide there are 49 active cases of which 48 are returned overseas travellers.   

It would appear that the testing rates are up again with 11,600 results reported in Victoria in the last 24 hours, 14,500 in NSW, 3,500 in QLD and 3,200 in SA.

Worldwide the figures are pretty dramatic again with 639,000 new infections in the last 24 hours and 12,000 deaths in the same timeframe.  Total number of infections during the pandemic is a touch over 69 million and total deaths due to the virus is 1.6 million.  The overall worldwide infection rates and death rates are not declining in any meaningful way.  

In the last week the USA reported 1,509,000 new infections an increase on the 1,200,000 new infections the week before.  The US recorded 17,000 deaths for the week, up from 12,000 the week before.  The US figures keep increasing nearly every week and don't currently show any sign of coming under any sort of control.  I understand that some US states have introduced more stringent lockdowns but it could be some weeks before any improvement is seen due to the more stringent lockdowns.  Hopefully if they can get some vaccines out into the general populace that might start to have some effect in due course.

After a couple of promising weeks Brazil has also shown a significant increase in the number of infections and deaths for the week.  Brazil reported 293,000 new infections, up from 270,000 the week before and 4,500 new deaths, an increase from 3,700 the previous week.

Mexico's new infections for the week at 71,000 have also shown an increase from 62,000 the previous week, however the weekly death figure of 4,100 is only marginally higher than the previous week's figure of 4,000.

India is still showing decreasing figures in both new infections and deaths.  India reported 229,000 new infections for the week, down from 267,000 the previous week and 3,100 deaths, down from 3,400 the previous week.

In Europe the UK, despite going into lockdown has reported a small increase in the number of new infections for the week.  The UK reported 108,000 new infections compared to 102,000 the previous week, but four weeks ago they reported 174,000 new infections in the week.  UK deaths were down for the week at 2,900 compared to 3,200 the previous week.

Spain's weekly new infection rate is down from 60,000 the previous week to 43,000 this week.  Their death rate is also lower at 1,200 for the current week down from 1,700 the previous week.  On 5/11 Spain reported 162,000 new infections for the week and 2,600 deaths.

Italy reported 128,000 new infections for the week compared to 161,000 the previous week and 4,700 deaths compared to 5,000 deaths the previous week.  On 19/11 Italy reported 244,000 new infections and their deaths peaked at 5,000 last week.

France reported 80,000 new infections for the week compared to 75,000 the previous week but this is still a dramatic improvement on the 322,000 new infections reported for the week ended 12/11.  France reported 2,800 deaths for the week compared to 3,200 last week and 4,200 deaths the week ended 19/11.

Although all of these European figures are disastrous by Australian standards, notwithstanding some weekly fluctuations they are all heading in the right direction especially when compared to their situations some 4 to 5 weeks ago.

Worldwide there were 4,400,000 new infections and 76,000 new deaths reported for the week.  These figures are the highest weekly figures to date and are part of a pattern of continually increasing infections and death figures worldwide.

The USA, Brazil, Mexico and India reported 48% of the worldwide new infections up from 43% last week and 37% of the weekly deaths an increase from 31% last week.

UK, Spain, Italy and France reported 8% of the worldwide new infections for the week down from 10% the previous week and 15% of the weekly deaths, down from 18% the previous week.

I have again listed below the top 10 countries by death per million with last week's figure in brackets (excluding the micro countries and including Australia and New Zealand for comparison purposes); 

1. Belgium 1,508  (1,446) deaths per million of population
2. Peru      1,099  (1,086)
3. Italy       1,022  (944)
4. Spain     1,005  (979)
5. UK            919  (877)
6. USA         894   (843)
7. Argentina 886   (863)
8. France     867   (824)
9. Mexico     856   (824)
10. Brazil       840   (819)

          Australia  35

          NZ            05

Italy has jumped one place from 4th to 3rd and the US has moved up the ladder from 7th to 6th.

The only thing keeping India out of this list is it's massive population.

It is so difficult to keep things in perspective.  We see 2,867 deaths in the UK and we say what a good result that is, if it happened here it would be disastrous and how do you grasp 76,000 deaths in a week worldwide. And this is happening week after week after week.

Corona Virus Daily Stats – Day 2 – Covid Safe Summer 

Date	Aus Infected	Aus Increase	Vic Infected	Vic Increase	Aus Death	Vic Death	Aus Hospl	Vic Hospital	Aus ICU	Vic ICU
7/12	27,972	7	20,345	0	908	820	29	0	0	0
8/12	27,984	12	20,345	0	908	820	38	0	0	0
9/12	27,992	8	20,345	0	908	820	32	0	0	0
10/12	28,000	8	20,345	0	908	820	34	0	0	0
11/12

Country	Population	Infected No	Infected Increase	Deaths No	Deaths Increase No	Deaths per Million Population
Belgium	11,500,000	594,572	15,360	17,507	721	1522
UK	68,000,000	1,766,819	107,563	62,566	2,867	920
Spain	47,000,000	1,725,473	42,940	47,019	1,235	1000
Italy	60,000,000	1,770,149	128,539	61,739	4,694	1029
Sweden	10,000,000	304,793	38,275	7,296	324	730
France	65,000,000	2,324,216	79,581	56,648	2,832	872
USA	331,000,000	15,817,968	1,508,672	296,637	16,792	896
Brazil	213,000,000	6,730,118	293,468	179,032	4,501	841
Mexico	129,000,000	1,193,255	70,893	110,874	4,109	859
South Africa	59,000,000	828,343	31,871	22,574	865	383
Russia	146,000,000	2,541,199	193,798	44,718	3,665	306
World	7,800,000,000	69,209,416	4,392,980	1,574,726	76,428	202
India	1,300,000,000	9,762,326	228,855	141,735	3,078	109
Australia	25,000,000	27,993	70	908	0	36
New Zealand	5,000,000	2,088	28	25	0	5

Corona Virus International Stats as at 10/12/2020

Remember: Wear your mask when you are buying your Bunnings sausage; no holidays in Britain for a while yet; be careful planning your computer upgrades (my most recent upgrade cost me $1,400); somebody is probably checking your poo; if in doubt get tested (it doesn't hurt, honestly); get the catgut strings in your tennis racket checked; as from 11.59pm tonight you can have a beer at the bar; keep an eye out for Germans with funny little moustaches; don't let possum pee rot your woodwork.