Blog Day 375 - Wednesday 07 April 2021

 I have had a look at the blog for 07 April 2020, twelve months ago, when we were in the middle of our first round of lockdowns.  My word I must have been bored, I wrote a long piece comparing the movie Zulu to our current battle against the corona virus and how we could take the lessons from the battle at Rorke's drift and apply them to our fight against the virus.

Reading back through it now it was, and still is a fine piece of writing.

Richard, one of my regular readers and correspondents, made the comment that we could be looking at no international travel for 12 months and the possibility of the grand prix in 2021 being cancelled.  How silly we all thought, surely that can't happen, who looks silly now?

Now, enough of the fond reminisces and back to the present.  Victoria has recorded 40 days of no local transmissions, however we do start to take in ROTs from sometime this week.  This will be the real test of the state's resolve and capabilities.

The travel bubble with NZ opens up for travel both ways on 18/04 and there is talk of further travel bubbles opening up with some Asian and Pacific countries in the not to distant future.  Of course even if a travel bubble is opened there is still the risk to travellers of being caught by border closures caused by future virus outbreaks.

There has been a corona virus related death reported in Queensland, however as the infection occurred in PNG and the patient was flown to Brisbane for treatment the death isn't included in the Qld or Australian national death figures.  The deceased was a 77 year old male and was possibly a previous governor of PNG.

Victoria has now reported 40 days without a local virus infection.  Victoria has one person, an international flight crew member in quarantine.  Australia wide there were a further 13 people recorded with the virus in the last 24 hours, all ROTs; 6 in NSW, 6 in Qld and 1 in SA.

Australia wide there are 154 people infected with the virus of which 135 are ROTs.  NSW currently has 47 infections including 46 ROTs; Qld has 73 infections of which 55 are ROTS.

I am not sure how to report the vaccination rate in Australia as there are wide discrepancies in the numbers depending on the source and now that some people are getting their second jab it is difficult to tell who is fully vaccinated (ie 2 jabs) and who has only had one jab.  One source tells me that 117,000 doses have been administered in Victoria (1,023 in the last 24 hours), of these 117,000 98,600 are 1st injections and 19,116 are 2nd injections.  Overall, Australia wide there has been 874,818 doses administered.  Make of that what you will.

Worldwide there were 394,000 new infections reported in the last 24 hours and 7,105 deaths in the same period.  The new infection figure is lower than recent days but I think that is probably as a result of lack of recording and reporting over the easter break rather than any real improvement in the figures.

After a record low figure of 34,000 two days ago the US daily new infection figure has bounced back up to 78,000 and after a death figure of 222 2 days ago the current daily death figure is 596.  

The UK figures appear to be reasonably consistent and reliable at 2,800 new infections for the 24 hour period and 28 deaths.

Brazil and France's new infection figures also appear to be artificially low at 28,600 and 10,800 respectively.  France reported 80,000 new infections the day before.

Corona Virus Daily Stats – April 2021 – Covid Normal (for the time being)

Date	Aus Infected	Aus Increase	Aus ROTs Increase	Vic Infected	Vic Increase	Vic ROTS Increase	*Aus Active Infection	*Aus ROTs	Vic Active Infection	Vic ROTs
01/04	29,323	17	11	20,484	0	0	163		1	1
02/04	29,335	8	7	20,484	0	0	159	147	1	1
03/04	29,341	6	5	20,484	0	0	151	143	1	1
04/04	29,348	7	7	20,484	0	0	143		1	1
05/04	29,357	9	9	20,484	0	0	149		1	1
06/04	29,363	7	7	20,484	0	0	148	129	1	1
07/04	29,377	12	12	20,484	0	0	147	128	1	1

Date	World Infection	Daily Increase	World Deaths	Daily Increase
01/04/21	128,822,013	683,042	2,815,151	12,262
02/04/21	129,524,770	711,626	2,827,020	11,861
03/04/21	130,235,782	628,853	2,837,694	10,189
04/04/21	130,768,885	533,103	2,846,114	8,420
05/04/21	131,217,283	448,398	2,852,494	6,380
06/04/21	131,714,949	394,108	2,860,077	7,105

	US & UK Daily New Infections & Death Numbers
Date	US New Infections	US Daily Deaths	UK New Infections	UK Daily Deaths
01/04/21	66,173	1,042	4,115	43
02/04/21	78,445	1,048	4,565	51
03/04/21	69,822	967	3,422	52
04/04/21	62,154	676	3,424	10
05/04/21	34,282	222	2,405	10
06/04/21	78,279	596	2,831	28
07/04/21