Blog Day 510 - Tuesday 24 August 2021 - Day 19 of Covid Lockdown V6.0

 A couple of days ago the good folk of metropolitan Melbourne achieved a total of 200 days lockdown for this pandemic.  Well done to all us, nearly a world record methinks.

I mentioned the other day that an engagement party, attended by about 70 people, was held in North Caulfield in contravention of the covid lockdown rules.  It has been announced today that 60 of those people have been fined a total of over $300,000.  

It has been an interesting week with the Shrine.  As you would be aware, the Shrine along with all other public museums and galleries has been closed for pretty much all of last year and this year.  

The Shrine website already has a virtual tour capability and works in a very similar manner to Google street, you can use the tour to "walk" through the Shrine on your PC, tablet or phone and look at the various exhibits and visit the sanctuary, the crypt and visitor centre etc.

Whilst the Shrine has been closed the Education staff using the magic of Zoom combined with the virtual tour capability have been developing and conducting virtual tours for school groups.  These virtual tours have proved to be very popular with the schools and the ed staff have decided to train some volunteers to conduct the tours.

I had my first training session yesterday where I "followed" one of the staff on a tour with a group of year 9 students.  We all met on Zoom and one of the staff narrates the tour and another staff member "navigates" using the virtual tour facility plus adding in specific graphics where necessary.  The students can ask questions or make comments on zoom, but being year 9's this is an unlikely event.

The tour went a lot smoother than I anticipated and I am looking forward to the opportunity to conduct my own tours in this manner, at least until we can get back to doing the real thing.

Talking about the real thing lets have a look at some covid numbers.

Victoria reported 51 new cases in the last 24 hours, of these 39 were not in isolation while infected.  Six of the reported cases are in Geelong, from one household, and there has been six new exposure sites listed in the Geelong area.  The CHO has stated that the Delta variant is so virulent that if it gets into a household every member of that household will be infected without exception.  Victoria received the results of 48,000 tests in the last 24 hours.

NSW reported 755 new cases in the last 24 hours which is a decrease on 803 the day before and 824 the day before that.  They received the results of 138,000 tests in the last 24 hours.  

By way of comparison in July, August last year in Victoria we were recording infection numbers similar to NSW currently.  For example on 05/08/20 Victoria recorded 700 new infections; on 02/08 626 infections and on 20/07 694 new infections.  At the same time Victoria was recording daily death rates of between 20 to 60 per day.

Currently, with a similar infection rate currently to Victoria's last year NSW is reporting death figures of around 4 or 5 per day and not every day.  Let's hope that this is as a result of the effect of the vaccinations kicking in.  NSW has now administered 6 million doses of the vaccine, nearly 4 million first doses and just under 2 million 2nd doses.

Australia wide there has been 17 million vaccination doses administered, 11 million first doses and 6 million second doses.  Victoria has now opened up the availability of the vaccine to 16 to 39 year old and apparently there is a guaranteed supply of the Pfizer vaccine for this group.  I think that means that anybody over the age of 16 in Victoria can now get vaccinated if they wish.

From cruising along with no locally acquired cases for some time NZ has now reported 38 new cases in the last 24 hours to bring their total of active cases to 183.  Fortunately no further deaths have arisen out of this current wave of the virus in NZ.

Corona Virus Daily Stats – 24 August 2021 – Day 19 of Covid Lockdown V6.0

Date	Aus Infected	Aus Increase	Aus ROTs Increase	Vic Infected	Vic Increase	Vic ROTS Increase	*Aus Active Infection	*Aus ROTs	Vic Active Infection	Vic ROT
01/08
02/08	34,612	230	8	20,950	2	0	3,338	100	134	?
03/08
04/08
05/08
06/08	35,698	308	0	20,967	6	0	4,252	129	75	7
07/08
08/08	36,328	290	15	21,010	13	2	4,730	121	100	4
09/08
10/08	37,010	383	4	21,041	20	0	5,335	121	111	3
11/08
12/08	37,754	382	3	21,079	23	0	5,884	105	137	2
13/08
14/08	36,658	497	2	21,119	21	0	6,593	109	163	2
15/08						NSW Increase		NSW Active Infection
16/08	39,615	524	4	21,166	22	0	7,452		205
17/08
18/08	40,774	684	5	21,215	24	0	8,455		246
19/08
20/08	42,228	716	4	21,328	57	646	9,496	8,978	349
21/08
22/08						824		10,337	440
23/08	44,922	894		21,526	71	803	11,661	10,984	494
24/08	45,754	842	7	21,577	51	755	12,477	11,739	522