Against all odds: how New Zealand is bending the Delta curve | Hacker News Reader

Against all odds: how New Zealand is bending the Delta curve

theguardian.com

I'm a kiwi and i've never understood why the world keeps announcing NZ as victorious when covid is a marathon. Ask whether we were successful in 5 years time.

It could become problematic if other countries like Australia start opening up and we see an exodus of young professionals including healthcare workers, the latter we're seeing severe shortages of even with no covid cases. In contrast to NZ, Australia is better resourced to live with Covid and their citizens are quite rebellious against lock-downs, so it wouldn't surprise me if they open up well before NZ which could make things very awkward if we're still fumbling around with an elimination strategy.

> i've never understood why the world keeps announcing NZ as victorious when covid is a marathon

We've been watching you have packed public spaces for 18 months now, while we've been unable to gather in groups of more than 4. I think most people saw NZ as successful enough to keep the lid on until you get everyone vaccinated.

Frankly, it seems like with sufficient border testing and vaccinations for people traveling abroad (at least), you should be able to maintain zero-community transmission.

> if they open up well before NZ which could make things very awkward if we're still fumbling around with an elimination strategy.

Is NZ not open now? I hear about a couple random 3 week lockdowns, but other than that it seems pretty normal.

> healthcare workers, the latter we're seeing severe shortages of even with no covid cases.

That's not unique in NZ. The US and UK, in spite of having very different COVID strategies from NZ, also have shortages of healthcare workers.

> That's not unique in NZ. The US and UK

Which is why it's a problem. My guess is these countries will all be able to offer much more $ in a battle for these workers.

The US and UK are pretty against bringing in medical personnel from outside the country. It was one of the reasons for Brexit and the US seems to refuse to recognize many non-US credentials. So I think in these two particular cases, it doesn't matter.

Aren’t many different countries “bending the Delta curve”? What does that mean exactly? For instance the US has reducing COVID cases right now (https://covid19.healthdata.org/united-states-of-america).

Previously to the pandemic, I had NZ up on the liberty list. Now we know where they stand when a near flu level emergency arises, makes you wonder how they’ll behave if it was multiples or worse!

They also put major gun restrictions in place after the mass shooting they had. It's almost like they have a definition of liberty that includes "can walk around unmasked without fear, because they took major steps early on and have been freer most of the pandemic". Like, collective action can yield better results for everyone.

I recently read three peer-reviewed papers comparing the morbidity of COVID-19 vs the flu, and what it came out to was that COVID-19 is roughly 6x more lethal per modern case.

I'm afraid I can't be bothered finding the links to those papers for you, because it was matter of curiosity. You have to take into account how easily COVID-19 spreads as well, and you don't need the finer details to see the bigger picture.

Let's do a litmus test on whether COVID-19 deaths are a problem compared to the flu. Mass graves dug for flu victims in the last 20 years: zero. Mass graves dug for COVID-19 victims in the last 2 years: a bunch.

COVID-19 IFR overall is something like 0.5% across all populations. While the typical seasonal flu is 0.1%, both are relatively harmless in the grand scheme of things. This becomes more clear if you look at ages under 50 - the IFR for them is astonishingly low, to the point that societal restrictions are effectively risk containment for the elderly or unhealthy (like the obese) at the expense of the young and healthy. I think that makes the discussion around the tradeoffs more difficult and nuanced. I’m not saying that any one approach is definitely right or wrong, but that there are legitimate perspectives and lines of reasoning to support a relatively wide set of approaches.

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