Interesting that elimination isn’t discussed—my jurisdiction (Western Australia) targeted this, and with strict border closures, mandatory 2 week quarantine for new entrants, we’ve not had a “wild” case in 6 months now (we have regular cases in hotel quarantine, but these don’t ‘escape’ into the wild). Life is normal here: music festivals, dine in restaurants, cinemas, service industry/economy has time to recover, no need to wear masks, and of course no deaths.
New Zealand is another example of this, as is the rest of Australia (Victoria has, in 2 months of lockdown, gone from 700 daily cases to 6), and, funnily enough, Mongolia.
I know there’s feasibility problems in a lot of places, especially because Australia and New Zealand, being islands, are pretty easy to isolate, but it seems like it would be much cheaper to improve border controls than to deal with a pandemic.
In conclusion, I know I’m really lucky to live where I do.
Interesting that elimination isn’t discussed—my jurisdiction (Western Australia) targeted this, and with strict border closures, mandatory 2 week quarantine for new entrants, we’ve not had a “wild” case in 6 months now (we have regular cases in hotel quarantine, but these don’t ‘escape’ into the wild). Life is normal here: music festivals, dine in restaurants, cinemas, service industry/economy has time to recover, no need to wear masks, and of course no deaths.
New Zealand is another example of this, as is the rest of Australia (Victoria has, in 2 months of lockdown, gone from 700 daily cases to 6), and, funnily enough, Mongolia.
I know there’s feasibility problems in a lot of places, especially because Australia and New Zealand, being islands, are pretty easy to isolate, but it seems like it would be much cheaper to improve border controls than to deal with a pandemic.
In conclusion, I know I’m really lucky to live where I do.