8 ms·

170 cases in one day and the army is deployed to enforce lockdowns. In my country we had over 10,000 cases yesterday and I will be going out for after work dri

by oars 5y ago

170 cases in one day and the army is deployed to enforce lockdowns. In my country we had over 10,000 cases yesterday and I will be going out for after work drinks at the end of this week to socialise. Does Australia just overspend on its military budget or am I misunderstanding why Australia is going to these extremes?

jimmy2020 5y ago
Yes, they withdrew from Afghanistan there's money to be spent domestically or internationally.
- oars 5y ago
  Thank you, this makes more sense now. It seems that it is normal for Australian soldiers to be deployed in Australia as they are not in Afghanistan. This article has just taken advantage of it for the headline and news content.
  - skhr0680 5y ago
    There's a difference between being deployed sitting around at your base doing Really Important Stuff and > Australian Defence Force soldiers will undergo training on the weekend before beginning unarmed patrols on Monday.
  - mimentum 5y ago
    The deployment isn't a standard practice. Just something that has been enforced as of late.
  - switch007 5y ago
    Normal for Australian soldiers to police the streets to keep people locked in their homes? When has this happened before 2020?
    - waste_monk 5y ago
      Not specifically to enforce a lockdown (and to clarify they are assisting police, it's not the ADF doing this by itself), but it's routine for the ADF to assist with disasters. Surely you remember the ADF helping out with the bushfires not too long ago? There were the big news items like civilians trapped by bushfires being evacuated by the RAN off of Mallacoota beach, but the ADF also provided an incredible amount of assistance with logistics, engineering, and so on... it is deeply unfair to assume the worst of them just because it's enforcing a lockdown.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - easygenes 5y ago
    Parent is missing <sarcasm> tag, I think.
    - jimmy2020 5y ago
      Yes.
bo0tzz 5y ago
Just because most countries are being exceedingly lax in their covid response, does not make Australia trying to actually contain it "extreme".
- ThomPete 5y ago
  If you have to deploy your military on your citizens you have in fact ventured way beyond into the extreme.
  - Barrin92 5y ago
    in many countries the military has a role to play during states of emergency or disasters or otherwise unusual situations like this, not every country is the US with its hyperbolic aversion to government or the state. The same bad takes keep happening every time an Anglosphere journalist sees the Gendarmerie on a French street.
    - ThomPete 5y ago
      Of course the military is used for other means. This time just isn't one of them and thus my point still stands. When you have to use military to enforce your policies you've lost the plot it's really that simple.
    - vladvasiliu 5y ago
      > The same bad takes keep happening every time an Anglosphere journalist sees the Gendarmerie on a French street. I'm not familiar with the "bad takes" happening in the Anglosphere, but it should be noted that the French Gendarmerie is not exactly the same thing as "the military". Until recently they were, technically, military, as in they were attached to the Defense Ministry. This has changed a few years ago, and are now attached to the Interior (Home) Ministry, like the "regular" Police. But this isn't what I'm arguing. Even before the change, the Gendarmerie was intended to police the citizens, even though they would sometime take part in external operations. They are basically "the police outside of cities". This is in contrast to the "regular military" whose goal is to operate outside of France. What is unusual is the "Operation Sentinelle", where actual soldiers are patrolling the streets of French cities in an effort to fight terrorism. But note that pretty much every action by the actual military inside of France is seen as exceptional, and there really aren't that many. For example, during the height of the Covid crisis last year, when hospitals were overflowing with the sick, the military transported some people from one hospital to another. This was considered fairly out of the ordinary, much more so than the national rail company preparing special TGVs (high-speed trains) for the same.
pacificmint 5y ago
> am I misunderstanding why Australia is going to these extremes? Australia had 923 COVID deaths total, for a population of 25 million. That’s 36 cases per million. For comparison, the US has 1,887 deaths per million. Most European states aren’t much better, or even worse, per capita. Now, you can argue if these extremes are worth it, or not, but it seems clear that what they are doing is saving lives.
- Aeolun 5y ago
  Saving lives maybe, but how many people have basically lost 2 years of their lives by now?
  - jackvalentine 5y ago
    It’s been a bit inconvenient but quite a stretch to say anyone “lost two years”. Life was basically back to normal in Australia until June. In my city we’ve had practically no restrictions for over a year.
  - easygenes 5y ago
    The lockdowns have been relatively short-lived and only in the city metros which were then or are currently experiencing outbreaks. So most people have only been in lock down for a few months, if at all.
    - nmcveity 5y ago
      As a Melbourne resident I really want a citation for this. Maybe the whole thing has been a nightmare and I will wake up shortly, who knows?
  - pjc50 5y ago
    Australian lockdowns have been much more intermittent because of their effectiveness; there have been some periods of no restrictions. (Would be good if someone had a calendar recording this)
  - 2muchcoffeeman 5y ago
GuB-42 5y ago
Different strategies. Australia wants to completely eliminate covid from the country, it means going all out when even a single case is detected, and no restriction otherwise. It is a strategy well adapted to a large, low density island country. Your country has decided to live with covid and adjust its response gradually.
- 2muchcoffeeman 5y ago
  I don’t think any reasonable person ever thought that was a viable long term strategy. We’ve detected all the variants of concern here. So eventually one was going to get past quarantine.
__alias 5y ago
Before the 170 daily case 'outbreak' we were able to go a fairly long time without any community transmissions. The point of military involvement is to try enforce an effective lockdown so people take lockdown seriously and we stop the spread as fast as possible while we finally start rolling out vaccines.
pjc50 5y ago
Australia and NZ are going for "zero covid"; the suppression of general community transmission when it appears, rather than letting it become endemic or having runaway caseloads. I've not seen this explicitly articulated but I think it may be linked to their long-standing onerous biosecurity rules for plants and animals, e.g. https://www.agriculture.gov.au/import/arrival/pests/plant_diseases https://www.agriculture.gov.au/import/arrival/pests/plant_di... . If Australia can be free of certain plant diseases, why not of human diseases? The result is a low death toll and really heavy lockdowns.
Untit1ed 5y ago
I think the big difference is that Australia has managed to have zero cases for most of the last 18 months, which has allowed it to go on pretty much as normal for much of that time. Although 170 cases is a lot less than 10,000 when you view it as a pure number, from an economic and lifestyle perspective the difference between 0 cases and 1 case is effectively more significant than 1 case and any number of cases greater than that - zero cases means that you can not only end restrictions, but also that people who normally wouldn't leave the house as long as there was any danger at all can go out and spend money without any fear of the virus. So that's why there's so much emphasis on locking down even with only 170 cases - it's about trying to get back to zero ASAP. There is an argument to be made for the fact that we'll have to live with covid eventually, but: 1. Vaccine numbers remain low 2. Given that people have seen lockdowns succeed in essentially ending covid before, and blame the government for both not locking down quickly enough in this outbreak and for the vaccination rollout, committing to living with covid now would be political suicide
quicklime 5y ago
There's a big difference between zero cases and one. When there are zero cases, you can (assuming a tight border and quarantine) act more-or-less as you did pre-pandemic. This is what most of Australia has been like, and what Sydney was like before this lockdown. When you have a small number of cases, you still have to take precautions to keep the reproduction rate below 1.0. It's up to each society to decide which strategy it wants to take. Australia has chosen eradication (zero cases) over suppression (a low and flat number of cases). The former lets you have periods of pre-pandemic behavior punctuated by short but extreme lockdowns, the latter means you get a constant set of restrictions until enough people are vaccinated.
tomjen3 5y ago
Australia did well with this strategy initially, then returned to normal months before the rest of the world and with really low deaths to show of. So they went ahead and used the strategy again, but this time (because delta is much worse) it didn't work, but they can't stop because the politicians who back this would take a hit if they admitted it. So they do the only thing they can, which is go at it, but harder. This is basically the US Vietnam war situation.
rdiddly 5y ago
They don't have their rifles with them. So arguably the words "force" and "army" don't even apply. (An 'army' generally has 'arms' or at least 'armor'.) It's just more bodies, more personnel. Cheaper than hiring a bunch of temps.

by oars 5y ago

jimmy2020 5y ago

Yes, they withdrew from Afghanistan there's money to be spent domestically or internationally.

oars 5y ago
Thank you, this makes more sense now. It seems that it is normal for Australian soldiers to be deployed in Australia as they are not in Afghanistan. This article has just taken advantage of it for the headline and news content.
- skhr0680 5y ago
  There's a difference between being deployed sitting around at your base doing Really Important Stuff and > Australian Defence Force soldiers will undergo training on the weekend before beginning unarmed patrols on Monday.
- mimentum 5y ago
  The deployment isn't a standard practice. Just something that has been enforced as of late.
- switch007 5y ago
  Normal for Australian soldiers to police the streets to keep people locked in their homes? When has this happened before 2020?
  - waste_monk 5y ago
    Not specifically to enforce a lockdown (and to clarify they are assisting police, it's not the ADF doing this by itself), but it's routine for the ADF to assist with disasters. Surely you remember the ADF helping out with the bushfires not too long ago? There were the big news items like civilians trapped by bushfires being evacuated by the RAN off of Mallacoota beach, but the ADF also provided an incredible amount of assistance with logistics, engineering, and so on... it is deeply unfair to assume the worst of them just because it's enforcing a lockdown.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- easygenes 5y ago
  Parent is missing <sarcasm> tag, I think.
  - jimmy2020 5y ago
    Yes.

bo0tzz 5y ago

Just because most countries are being exceedingly lax in their covid response, does not make Australia trying to actually contain it "extreme".

ThomPete 5y ago
If you have to deploy your military on your citizens you have in fact ventured way beyond into the extreme.
- Barrin92 5y ago
  in many countries the military has a role to play during states of emergency or disasters or otherwise unusual situations like this, not every country is the US with its hyperbolic aversion to government or the state. The same bad takes keep happening every time an Anglosphere journalist sees the Gendarmerie on a French street.
  - ThomPete 5y ago
    Of course the military is used for other means. This time just isn't one of them and thus my point still stands. When you have to use military to enforce your policies you've lost the plot it's really that simple.
  - vladvasiliu 5y ago
    > The same bad takes keep happening every time an Anglosphere journalist sees the Gendarmerie on a French street. I'm not familiar with the "bad takes" happening in the Anglosphere, but it should be noted that the French Gendarmerie is not exactly the same thing as "the military". Until recently they were, technically, military, as in they were attached to the Defense Ministry. This has changed a few years ago, and are now attached to the Interior (Home) Ministry, like the "regular" Police. But this isn't what I'm arguing. Even before the change, the Gendarmerie was intended to police the citizens, even though they would sometime take part in external operations. They are basically "the police outside of cities". This is in contrast to the "regular military" whose goal is to operate outside of France. What is unusual is the "Operation Sentinelle", where actual soldiers are patrolling the streets of French cities in an effort to fight terrorism. But note that pretty much every action by the actual military inside of France is seen as exceptional, and there really aren't that many. For example, during the height of the Covid crisis last year, when hospitals were overflowing with the sick, the military transported some people from one hospital to another. This was considered fairly out of the ordinary, much more so than the national rail company preparing special TGVs (high-speed trains) for the same.

pacificmint 5y ago

> am I misunderstanding why Australia is going to these extremes? Australia had 923 COVID deaths total, for a population of 25 million. That’s 36 cases per million. For comparison, the US has 1,887 deaths per million. Most European states aren’t much better, or even worse, per capita. Now, you can argue if these extremes are worth it, or not, but it seems clear that what they are doing is saving lives.

Aeolun 5y ago
Saving lives maybe, but how many people have basically lost 2 years of their lives by now?
- jackvalentine 5y ago
  It’s been a bit inconvenient but quite a stretch to say anyone “lost two years”. Life was basically back to normal in Australia until June. In my city we’ve had practically no restrictions for over a year.
- easygenes 5y ago
  The lockdowns have been relatively short-lived and only in the city metros which were then or are currently experiencing outbreaks. So most people have only been in lock down for a few months, if at all.
  - nmcveity 5y ago
    As a Melbourne resident I really want a citation for this. Maybe the whole thing has been a nightmare and I will wake up shortly, who knows?
- pjc50 5y ago
  Australian lockdowns have been much more intermittent because of their effectiveness; there have been some periods of no restrictions. (Would be good if someone had a calendar recording this)
- 2muchcoffeeman 5y ago

GuB-42 5y ago

Different strategies. Australia wants to completely eliminate covid from the country, it means going all out when even a single case is detected, and no restriction otherwise. It is a strategy well adapted to a large, low density island country. Your country has decided to live with covid and adjust its response gradually.

2muchcoffeeman 5y ago
I don’t think any reasonable person ever thought that was a viable long term strategy. We’ve detected all the variants of concern here. So eventually one was going to get past quarantine.

__alias 5y ago

Before the 170 daily case 'outbreak' we were able to go a fairly long time without any community transmissions. The point of military involvement is to try enforce an effective lockdown so people take lockdown seriously and we stop the spread as fast as possible while we finally start rolling out vaccines.

pjc50 5y ago

Australia and NZ are going for "zero covid"; the suppression of general community transmission when it appears, rather than letting it become endemic or having runaway caseloads. I've not seen this explicitly articulated but I think it may be linked to their long-standing onerous biosecurity rules for plants and animals, e.g. https://www.agriculture.gov.au/import/arrival/pests/plant_diseases https://www.agriculture.gov.au/import/arrival/pests/plant_di... . If Australia can be free of certain plant diseases, why not of human diseases? The result is a low death toll and really heavy lockdowns.

Untit1ed 5y ago

I think the big difference is that Australia has managed to have zero cases for most of the last 18 months, which has allowed it to go on pretty much as normal for much of that time. Although 170 cases is a lot less than 10,000 when you view it as a pure number, from an economic and lifestyle perspective the difference between 0 cases and 1 case is effectively more significant than 1 case and any number of cases greater than that - zero cases means that you can not only end restrictions, but also that people who normally wouldn't leave the house as long as there was any danger at all can go out and spend money without any fear of the virus. So that's why there's so much emphasis on locking down even with only 170 cases - it's about trying to get back to zero ASAP. There is an argument to be made for the fact that we'll have to live with covid eventually, but: 1. Vaccine numbers remain low 2. Given that people have seen lockdowns succeed in essentially ending covid before, and blame the government for both not locking down quickly enough in this outbreak and for the vaccination rollout, committing to living with covid now would be political suicide

quicklime 5y ago

There's a big difference between zero cases and one. When there are zero cases, you can (assuming a tight border and quarantine) act more-or-less as you did pre-pandemic. This is what most of Australia has been like, and what Sydney was like before this lockdown. When you have a small number of cases, you still have to take precautions to keep the reproduction rate below 1.0. It's up to each society to decide which strategy it wants to take. Australia has chosen eradication (zero cases) over suppression (a low and flat number of cases). The former lets you have periods of pre-pandemic behavior punctuated by short but extreme lockdowns, the latter means you get a constant set of restrictions until enough people are vaccinated.

tomjen3 5y ago

Australia did well with this strategy initially, then returned to normal months before the rest of the world and with really low deaths to show of. So they went ahead and used the strategy again, but this time (because delta is much worse) it didn't work, but they can't stop because the politicians who back this would take a hit if they admitted it. So they do the only thing they can, which is go at it, but harder. This is basically the US Vietnam war situation.

rdiddly 5y ago

They don't have their rifles with them. So arguably the words "force" and "army" don't even apply. (An 'army' generally has 'arms' or at least 'armor'.) It's just more bodies, more personnel. Cheaper than hiring a bunch of temps.