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Has the government of Australia given any rational for banning Australians from leaving? What is the public discourse like over this? I also heard that Austra

by Teever 5y ago

Has the government of Australia given any rational for banning Australians from leaving? What is the public discourse like over this? I also heard that Australia was making it very difficult for Australians who were abroad prior to COVID from coming back, is that true? Has that changed much? Again, does the government give a rational for this decision? And the discourse? I think that Australia and NZ were right to lock down hard and stamp out COVID but I'm a bit baffled by the fact that it has managed to get in a few times and more specifically how it has managed to get in. It seems to be that once if you're an island the size of Australia and you've eliminated domestic transmission the simple solution is to route all international flights to an airport in remote location (not one in a large city) where absolutely everyone involved in the process be they passangers, crew or quarantine staff must stay for two weeks with zero exceptions. If you did that then you could easily repatriate Australians living abroad.

danuker 5y ago
> where absolutely everyone involved [...] must stay for two weeks with zero exceptions. You might be infecting some more people during those two weeks, which means you'd have to prolong the quarantine.
ccakes 5y ago
> I also heard that Australia was making it very difficult for Australians who were abroad prior to COVID from coming back, is that true? Has that changed much? As an Australian living abroad - nope, nothing has changed. It's near impossible for us to get back although at this point, why would I want to.. > And the discourse? Australians overseas are distraught with many being forced to watch friends and family go through tragedy from afar. The ones living at home don't seem to give a crap at all - "you left, serves you right" isn't an uncommon sentiment. It's been discussed in other posts recently on HN about Australia - life there is pretty good and Australians are generally laid back to a fault. If a problem doesn't affect an individual on a personal level, it doesn't exist. </rant>
- bamboozled 5y ago
  Because you might have family you love and care about living there who you'd want to see? Feeling a bit East and West Berlin right now.
- nazka 5y ago
  That’s what I read many times. Politicians and corporations can do whatever they want because “life is good”.
vermilingua 5y ago
The rationale for preventing citizens leaving is that they may catch COVID abroad then rely on govt. intervention to get back home as a "stranded" Aussie. This is of course nonsense, as govt. intervention to get home has been worth exactly fuck all over the last 18 months. An acquaintance of mine went overseas for his mother's funeral, was told he wasn't allowed to return, managed to get back on the constraint that he flew business (we want rich people back here, after all), then had to fly to South Australia (we are in NSW), quarantine for two weeks, hire a car, and drive back to NSW where he was required to quarantine for two weeks at the border before returning home. Whether all that was indeed necessary to prevent the spread of COVID (despite several negative tests and all but total isolation in that time) is up for debate, but yes the government certainly makes it as hard as possible to enter the country, virtually impossible unless you can purchase upper-class tickets (bribe the border force).
rmccue 5y ago
They did that; Howard Springs is a remote quarantine facility. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/20/world/australia/howard-springs-quarantine.html https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/20/world/australia/howard-sp...
grecy 5y ago
> Has the government of Australia given any rational for banning Australians from leaving? Somewhere after "flatten the curve", Australia aimed for "covid zero" - so they don't want any cases in the country, at all. They did well at that for most of the pandemic, but now delta is running rampant. They don't want anyone leaving, because they know you'll just come back again and you might bring covid in. > What is the public discourse like over this? There was a court case about it being unconstitutional, but it got over ruled because "dangerous times". [1] > I also heard that Australia was making it very difficult for Australians who were abroad prior to COVID from coming back, is that true? (for what it's worth, I returned to Australia from Canada in late June 2021 - so I went through all of this). Again, they're trying to keep covid out, so they have a strict limit on the number of people that can fly into the country from the outside world. Right now it's 3,035 people per week for the entire country [2]. With numbers so restricted, and a mandatory 2 weeks of being locked in a hotel for the cost of $3000, it's difficult to get a flight. From Canada it wasn't nearly as bad as the media makes it out to be, but supposedly there are well over 10,000 people "trying" to get back... though in my experience, and talking to everyone in my quarantine hotel and on my flight, I don't actually believe that's true. > Has that changed much? Again, does the government give a rational for this decision? And the discourse? The incoming people cap was halved in July because of the current Delta outbreak (which escaped hotel quarantine). The government's justification is "dangerous times". The discourse is "this is being done for your safety, and you should be thankful". > I'm a bit baffled by the fact that it has managed to get in a few times and more specifically how it has managed to get in. After going through it myself, I'm shocked covid didn't escape quarantine more. Just in Sydney airport more than 10 people spoke face to face with all of us arrivals, touched my passport with bare hands, etc. etc. Multiple people picked up and moved my bags, were physically close to me in elevators, etc. etc. If I were running the show, anyone coming into the country would be treated like they had the zombie plague and nobody would get within 10 feet of them. Certainly nobody would be touching their bags and physically touching documents. > the simple solution is to route all international flights to an airport in remote location (not one in a large city) where absolutely everyone involved in the process be they passengers, crew or quarantine staff must stay for two weeks with zero exceptions. Surely good in theory, but where will you find a remote location with a big enough airport and enough accommodation you can just take over? also remember staff want to have days off, food must be delivered, people in quarantine want packages delivered, etc. etc. [1] https://apnews.com/article/asia-pacific-australia-lifestyle-travel-coronavirus-pandemic-a1d239e80be05c8cf393ec67d1b6cce2 https://apnews.com/article/asia-pacific-australia-lifestyle-... [2] https://www.mondaq.com/australia/health-safety/1090494/decrease-in-australia39s-incoming-passenger-cap https://www.mondaq.com/australia/health-safety/1090494/decre...
silverpepsi 5y ago
Why would a mere 2 week quarantine be sufficient to prevent someone coming in from spreading it domestically? AFAIK 2 weeks is only good enough to catch around 99.99% of cases. That's plenty of cases getting through.
- postingawayonhn 5y ago
  I don't believe Australia or NZ has had anyone leave quarantine after 2 weeks and then test positive. The only exception might be where there was transmission inside a facility.
  - grecy 5y ago
    Actually the famous case that escaped in Adelaide quarantine was exactly that. Guy tested negative before the flight, and on days 2, 7 and 14 of quarantine. Then drives around and spreads it. They assume he caught it on his last or second last day in quarantine. Which is why I had to have tests 72 hours before my flight, then on days 2, 7 & 14 of quarantine, then yet another test on day 16
    - postingawayonhn 5y ago
      I am aware that has happened on a couple of occasions. "might be" was probably the wrong choice of words, "have been" would probably have been better.
  - godmode2019 5y ago
    This happened in NZ, so they started separating into cohorts. Old don't mix with new arrivals, previously anyone could go to the common room
  - silverpepsi 5y ago
    Well that's just pure luck. Incubation periods of 34 days for this thing are not unknown
- Teever 5y ago
  I think a generous interpretation of my comment regarding 2 week quarantine would be "the period that is sufficient to catch 100% of active infections of COVID-19." Perhaps that is 2.5 or 3 weeks? Either way, the fact remains that Australia's decision to leave thousands of their citizens stranded abroad and to lock their citizens in their country is both peculiar and unreasonable.
postingawayonhn 5y ago
> route all international flights to an airport in remote location (not one in a large city) where absolutely everyone involved in the process be they passangers, crew or quarantine staff must stay for two weeks with zero exceptions. That's not practical. You need capacity to house at least 10,000 people in quarantine, then another 1,000 staff to look after them. Ideally you'd also be close to a major hospital and the airlines certainly wouldn't sign up to having their staff made to quarantine after every inbound flight.
- Teever 5y ago
  So increase the price until it's a break even proposition? A country shouldn't be lock their population inside and refuse to let citizens back in for an indefinite period of time. That's insane.
  - postingawayonhn 5y ago
    I didn't say anything about price.
- bb101 5y ago
  A large federally-funded quarantine facility on the outskirts of each state capital would fulfill the need for quarantine that can operate at capacity, whilst limiting transmission. It's not rocket science, but unfortunately it is politics. The past couple of years have caused me to really become ashamed of being Australian. Being part of an increasingly globalised society, I found the government's blanket dictat of "Australians come home now" to belong to another era. With 4% of its population living in other countries, one would assume they would try harder to not alienate their diaspora.
  - postingawayonhn 5y ago
    It's not rocket science but does require some foresight. Realistically it would take 6 months - 1 year to fully build out quarantine sites that could fully replace hotel quarantine. If the governments had started on this in March 2020 it would have been worthwhile but these facilities are only just starting to be built now, are too small to entirely replace hotel quarantine, and will be largely redundant by the time they open if NSW and VIC continue on their current paths.
jlangenauer 5y ago
It got in because quarantine is a complex system (unless you completely seal your borders, and don't accept things like medicine), and complex systems do not operate perfectly forever. Australia foolishly believed that they could choose if and when Covid entered their country, which explains the sheer complancy at all levels of government in dealing with it. This was never true. The result was that Australia purchased, at enormous cost, some covid-free time, and then proceeded to piss it up against the wall. (As an aside: I'm Australian, and live outside Australia. I do not want to be "repatriated", I want to simply be able to visit the country I'm a citizen of, without being banned from leaving again, and without spending thousands of dollars on quarantine.)
- clouddrover 5y ago
  > Australia foolishly believed that they could choose if and when Covid entered their country No. They believed they could limit covid cases and they were right. Australia's still got some of the best covid results in the world, even with the currently rising case numbers: https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/ https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/ https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/map.html https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/map.html
  - tallanvor 5y ago
    Well, they have lower numbers of confirmed cases, but they have a higher death rate than some countries. As an example, Norway has registered 3 times as many cases, but fewer deaths. And while Norway, especially Oslo, has had strong lockdowns, they were nowhere near as onerous as what Melbourne and Sidney have gone through. Australia bought themselves time, but squandered it rather than ensuring that as many people as possible were vaccinated.
    - roenxi 5y ago
      Squandered is not really an appropriate take. Australia's cases are just about to leave triple digits daily and we've already got 30% of the country vaccinated, and most people have been given at least a first dose. This is an enviable position, the edge is going to be taken right off when the case numbers are get high. And the elderly have nearly finished with the vaccination campaign. And we were struggling to lay hands on the vaccine a few months ago. Supplies were going to countries that honestly needed it more than Australia (cough India cough).
mdoms 5y ago
> It seems to be that once if you're an island the size of Australia and you've eliminated domestic transmission the simple solution is to route all international flights to an airport in remote location (not one in a large city) where absolutely everyone involved in the process be they passangers, crew or quarantine staff must stay for two weeks with zero exceptions. Good luck staffing such a facility.

by Teever 5y ago

danuker 5y ago

> where absolutely everyone involved [...] must stay for two weeks with zero exceptions. You might be infecting some more people during those two weeks, which means you'd have to prolong the quarantine.

ccakes 5y ago

> I also heard that Australia was making it very difficult for Australians who were abroad prior to COVID from coming back, is that true? Has that changed much? As an Australian living abroad - nope, nothing has changed. It's near impossible for us to get back although at this point, why would I want to.. > And the discourse? Australians overseas are distraught with many being forced to watch friends and family go through tragedy from afar. The ones living at home don't seem to give a crap at all - "you left, serves you right" isn't an uncommon sentiment. It's been discussed in other posts recently on HN about Australia - life there is pretty good and Australians are generally laid back to a fault. If a problem doesn't affect an individual on a personal level, it doesn't exist. </rant>

bamboozled 5y ago
Because you might have family you love and care about living there who you'd want to see? Feeling a bit East and West Berlin right now.
nazka 5y ago
That’s what I read many times. Politicians and corporations can do whatever they want because “life is good”.

vermilingua 5y ago

The rationale for preventing citizens leaving is that they may catch COVID abroad then rely on govt. intervention to get back home as a "stranded" Aussie. This is of course nonsense, as govt. intervention to get home has been worth exactly fuck all over the last 18 months. An acquaintance of mine went overseas for his mother's funeral, was told he wasn't allowed to return, managed to get back on the constraint that he flew business (we want rich people back here, after all), then had to fly to South Australia (we are in NSW), quarantine for two weeks, hire a car, and drive back to NSW where he was required to quarantine for two weeks at the border before returning home. Whether all that was indeed necessary to prevent the spread of COVID (despite several negative tests and all but total isolation in that time) is up for debate, but yes the government certainly makes it as hard as possible to enter the country, virtually impossible unless you can purchase upper-class tickets (bribe the border force).

rmccue 5y ago

They did that; Howard Springs is a remote quarantine facility. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/20/world/australia/howard-springs-quarantine.html https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/20/world/australia/howard-sp...

grecy 5y ago

> Has the government of Australia given any rational for banning Australians from leaving? Somewhere after "flatten the curve", Australia aimed for "covid zero" - so they don't want any cases in the country, at all. They did well at that for most of the pandemic, but now delta is running rampant. They don't want anyone leaving, because they know you'll just come back again and you might bring covid in. > What is the public discourse like over this? There was a court case about it being unconstitutional, but it got over ruled because "dangerous times". [1] > I also heard that Australia was making it very difficult for Australians who were abroad prior to COVID from coming back, is that true? (for what it's worth, I returned to Australia from Canada in late June 2021 - so I went through all of this). Again, they're trying to keep covid out, so they have a strict limit on the number of people that can fly into the country from the outside world. Right now it's 3,035 people per week for the entire country [2]. With numbers so restricted, and a mandatory 2 weeks of being locked in a hotel for the cost of $3000, it's difficult to get a flight. From Canada it wasn't nearly as bad as the media makes it out to be, but supposedly there are well over 10,000 people "trying" to get back... though in my experience, and talking to everyone in my quarantine hotel and on my flight, I don't actually believe that's true. > Has that changed much? Again, does the government give a rational for this decision? And the discourse? The incoming people cap was halved in July because of the current Delta outbreak (which escaped hotel quarantine). The government's justification is "dangerous times". The discourse is "this is being done for your safety, and you should be thankful". > I'm a bit baffled by the fact that it has managed to get in a few times and more specifically how it has managed to get in. After going through it myself, I'm shocked covid didn't escape quarantine more. Just in Sydney airport more than 10 people spoke face to face with all of us arrivals, touched my passport with bare hands, etc. etc. Multiple people picked up and moved my bags, were physically close to me in elevators, etc. etc. If I were running the show, anyone coming into the country would be treated like they had the zombie plague and nobody would get within 10 feet of them. Certainly nobody would be touching their bags and physically touching documents. > the simple solution is to route all international flights to an airport in remote location (not one in a large city) where absolutely everyone involved in the process be they passengers, crew or quarantine staff must stay for two weeks with zero exceptions. Surely good in theory, but where will you find a remote location with a big enough airport and enough accommodation you can just take over? also remember staff want to have days off, food must be delivered, people in quarantine want packages delivered, etc. etc. [1] https://apnews.com/article/asia-pacific-australia-lifestyle-travel-coronavirus-pandemic-a1d239e80be05c8cf393ec67d1b6cce2 https://apnews.com/article/asia-pacific-australia-lifestyle-... [2] https://www.mondaq.com/australia/health-safety/1090494/decrease-in-australia39s-incoming-passenger-cap https://www.mondaq.com/australia/health-safety/1090494/decre...

silverpepsi 5y ago

Why would a mere 2 week quarantine be sufficient to prevent someone coming in from spreading it domestically? AFAIK 2 weeks is only good enough to catch around 99.99% of cases. That's plenty of cases getting through.

postingawayonhn 5y ago
I don't believe Australia or NZ has had anyone leave quarantine after 2 weeks and then test positive. The only exception might be where there was transmission inside a facility.
- grecy 5y ago
  Actually the famous case that escaped in Adelaide quarantine was exactly that. Guy tested negative before the flight, and on days 2, 7 and 14 of quarantine. Then drives around and spreads it. They assume he caught it on his last or second last day in quarantine. Which is why I had to have tests 72 hours before my flight, then on days 2, 7 & 14 of quarantine, then yet another test on day 16
  - postingawayonhn 5y ago
    I am aware that has happened on a couple of occasions. "might be" was probably the wrong choice of words, "have been" would probably have been better.
- godmode2019 5y ago
  This happened in NZ, so they started separating into cohorts. Old don't mix with new arrivals, previously anyone could go to the common room
- silverpepsi 5y ago
  Well that's just pure luck. Incubation periods of 34 days for this thing are not unknown
Teever 5y ago
I think a generous interpretation of my comment regarding 2 week quarantine would be "the period that is sufficient to catch 100% of active infections of COVID-19." Perhaps that is 2.5 or 3 weeks? Either way, the fact remains that Australia's decision to leave thousands of their citizens stranded abroad and to lock their citizens in their country is both peculiar and unreasonable.

postingawayonhn 5y ago

> route all international flights to an airport in remote location (not one in a large city) where absolutely everyone involved in the process be they passangers, crew or quarantine staff must stay for two weeks with zero exceptions. That's not practical. You need capacity to house at least 10,000 people in quarantine, then another 1,000 staff to look after them. Ideally you'd also be close to a major hospital and the airlines certainly wouldn't sign up to having their staff made to quarantine after every inbound flight.

Teever 5y ago
So increase the price until it's a break even proposition? A country shouldn't be lock their population inside and refuse to let citizens back in for an indefinite period of time. That's insane.
- postingawayonhn 5y ago
  I didn't say anything about price.
bb101 5y ago
A large federally-funded quarantine facility on the outskirts of each state capital would fulfill the need for quarantine that can operate at capacity, whilst limiting transmission. It's not rocket science, but unfortunately it is politics. The past couple of years have caused me to really become ashamed of being Australian. Being part of an increasingly globalised society, I found the government's blanket dictat of "Australians come home now" to belong to another era. With 4% of its population living in other countries, one would assume they would try harder to not alienate their diaspora.
- postingawayonhn 5y ago
  It's not rocket science but does require some foresight. Realistically it would take 6 months - 1 year to fully build out quarantine sites that could fully replace hotel quarantine. If the governments had started on this in March 2020 it would have been worthwhile but these facilities are only just starting to be built now, are too small to entirely replace hotel quarantine, and will be largely redundant by the time they open if NSW and VIC continue on their current paths.

jlangenauer 5y ago

It got in because quarantine is a complex system (unless you completely seal your borders, and don't accept things like medicine), and complex systems do not operate perfectly forever. Australia foolishly believed that they could choose if and when Covid entered their country, which explains the sheer complancy at all levels of government in dealing with it. This was never true. The result was that Australia purchased, at enormous cost, some covid-free time, and then proceeded to piss it up against the wall. (As an aside: I'm Australian, and live outside Australia. I do not want to be "repatriated", I want to simply be able to visit the country I'm a citizen of, without being banned from leaving again, and without spending thousands of dollars on quarantine.)

clouddrover 5y ago
> Australia foolishly believed that they could choose if and when Covid entered their country No. They believed they could limit covid cases and they were right. Australia's still got some of the best covid results in the world, even with the currently rising case numbers: https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/ https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/ https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/map.html https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/map.html
- tallanvor 5y ago
  Well, they have lower numbers of confirmed cases, but they have a higher death rate than some countries. As an example, Norway has registered 3 times as many cases, but fewer deaths. And while Norway, especially Oslo, has had strong lockdowns, they were nowhere near as onerous as what Melbourne and Sidney have gone through. Australia bought themselves time, but squandered it rather than ensuring that as many people as possible were vaccinated.
  - roenxi 5y ago
    Squandered is not really an appropriate take. Australia's cases are just about to leave triple digits daily and we've already got 30% of the country vaccinated, and most people have been given at least a first dose. This is an enviable position, the edge is going to be taken right off when the case numbers are get high. And the elderly have nearly finished with the vaccination campaign. And we were struggling to lay hands on the vaccine a few months ago. Supplies were going to countries that honestly needed it more than Australia (cough India cough).

mdoms 5y ago

> It seems to be that once if you're an island the size of Australia and you've eliminated domestic transmission the simple solution is to route all international flights to an airport in remote location (not one in a large city) where absolutely everyone involved in the process be they passangers, crew or quarantine staff must stay for two weeks with zero exceptions. Good luck staffing such a facility.