Probably has a lot to do with the high cost of health care in America which means a lot of people don’t seek treatment because they can’t afford it or are not willing to spend the money.
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But also because it was so new, no one knew how serious it was or exactly how to treat it.
We were lucky in Australia to have the benefit of learning from other countries mistakes and experiences so that it didn’t get as bad here.
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I think we took better precautions here too. I remember how much more the Americans were kicking up a storm about their freedom and being allowed to do whatever they wanted to do. That had consequences.
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Natural selection at that point isn’t it?
It’s really triggering seeing this thread active again. 
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COVID is still around of course, it might take years to go away, or maybe never, and might continue to evolve and mutate.
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I tested positive Thursday a week ago. Was still showing positive a week later. Only really tested tho as had some in the house. Was a lot milder than I had when it was rampant in the beginning.
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Definitely, the response in Australia in the first couple of months (March through to May 2020) was one of the best in the world in my view and saved countless lives. Definitely helped that state and federal governments were largely on the same page at that point in time though.
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The NSW government will withdraw and repay more than 23,000 fines issued during the COVID-19 pandemic after receiving fresh legal advice.
More than 50,000 penalty notices were issued for breaching public health orders during the height of the pandemic, according to the government.
In 2022, Revenue NSW withdrew more than 36,000 penalty notices because the NSW Commissioner of Fines Administration found that those penalty notices did not comply with the Fines Act.
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A committee of the United States Congress has backed the theory that a lab leak caused the COVID-19 pandemic.
In a report released on Monday, the Republican-controlled House of Representatives Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis said it had concluded that the coronavirus “likely emerged because of a laboratory or research related accident”.
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The gain of function research (banned in US by Obama in 2014) was partly funded by Fauci while he stood in front of the US and the word and said it was a conspiracy theory that it came from a lab. No wonder Biden gave him a pardon.
Yesterday was 5 years since the first COVID case was recorded in Australia
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Well, it’s now been 5 years to the day that NSW (and I think pretty much the whole country) first went into a COVID induced lockdown.
It was a Monday, all businesses were allowed to open until midday before the lockdown started. I vividly remember things like people going to the pub for their last drink in what was going to be quite a while and the being kicked out right on 12pm.
It was so eerie seeing our lives being changed in an instant, just like that.
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Footy was suspended until May 31. My Pies had a big win over the Bulldogs (the team we played against on Friday night) at an empty Marvel Stadium and finished that round 2nd on the ladder. We didn’t play another game until June which was a 36-36 all draw against then-reigning premier Richmond
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I remember going to Mittagong to get some lunch when I saw them packing up the chairs in the food court at the Marketplace. Very eerie times. I also did see the news about the NRL Season getting suspended which disappointed me as I was looking forward to watching the Dragons play Canberra on that Thursday Night. Of course the NRL restarted a couple of months later.
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Fuck feels much longer now
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Explosive document reveals Melbourne’s Covid curfew was not based on medical advice
An explosive document released this week after a 4½-year legal row shows former Premier Daniel Andrews and his government’s unprecedented decision to lock Victorians in their homes between 8pm and 5am for two months in 2020, was “not occurring on public health advice but is a decision taken by Cabinet”.
An email exchange between former chief health officer Brett Sutton and then public health commander Finn Romanes prove that the extreme lockdown measure had not been proposed by health experts, although they ultimately supported the move as a way to limit transmission of the virus.
At 5pm (on August 2, 2020), just hours before the 8pm curfew came into effect, Dr Romanes – as public health commander employed by the Department of Health and Human Services – wrote to Professor Sutton to seek his approval to issue a public health direction to mirror the government’s curfew plan.
“I note that I have been advised by (Department of Justice and Community Safety secretary) Kate Houghton and others that the action of a curfew is a clear action within the State of Disaster and there is a clear desire within government to mirror that within the State of Emergency, however note that the idea of a curfew has not arisen from public health advice in the first instance,” he wrote.
“In this way, the action of issuing a curfew is a mirror to the State of Disaster and is not occurring on public health advice but is a decision taken by cabinet and announced today, as an important step in the response.
“On those terms, that cabinet has formed a view and announced that view, do you agree that a Direction can be issued by me indicating a curfew?”
Professor Sutton responded half an hour later to give Dr Romanes the green light to issue a public health direction in support of the curfew.
“Your assessment is correct as I understand it,” he responded.
Despite Professor Sutton agreeing “there appears to be merit in it (the curfew) limiting opportunities for transmission”, the correspondence, which the government has for nearly five years fought to keep secret, exposes that it was a decision made by government.
Paywall free version
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Woah, this changes everything. End lockdown now!
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