Lockdowns and lock-steps

Victoria’s latest lockdown shows that flattening the curve has somehow morphed into an unspoken and impossible strategy of elimination. By Beverley McArthur.

On March 30th last year, the Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews, announced the state would enter Stage 3 restrictions to ‘flatten the curve’.

At that point, four people had died of coronavirus in the state. The ABC’s Health expert Norman Swan was predicting 150,000 people in Australia would die.

At that rate, the stakes were high.

But the words, and the reality, have never quite matched up.

Today, 910 people across Australia have died from COVID-19. 820 of these deaths, or 90 per cent, were in Victoria. 655 of these were aged care residents with the majority exposed to the escaped virus from Melbourne hotel quarantine. 

The problems can be observed across the month of March 2020 – when the daily press conference became the norm: the Premier sprinkling us with his stardust and lulling the state into a daily stupor. Millions still haven’t woken up.

Earlier that month, on March 10th, the Premier said “Victoria has a world-class health system that is well-prepared to deal with an outbreak” and that all measures in Victoria “must be proportionate to the threat”.

He said, “This is the time to plan and prepare.” He went on: “But when it comes to protecting those most at risk, we need to be ready.”

452 days since those statements, and other than him falling down stairs, one wonders what has happened. 

How well did they plan and prepare hotel quarantine? How well did they protect the most vulnerable, given the state’s most vulnerable were not protected?

If they were planned and prepared – why are we in lockdown now – with seemingly no other option but the Big Button?

Then on 15th March 2020, the Premier and his then Health Minister Jenny Mikakos – the only Minister with a memory in the Coate Inquiry – announced a $100 million COVID-19 response package to boost hospital capacity in “…preparation for the pandemic peak.” 

Three days later, on 18th March 2020, Premier Andrews put more restrictions in place to “flatten the curve.”

On that day, with “121 confirmed cases of coronavirus in Victoria and 464 confirmed cases nationally”, indoor public gatherings of more than 100 people were banned.

Yet, the current lockdown was imposed with just 25 infected people.

And somewhere, at some time, ‘flattening the curve’ morphed into an unspoken, and impossible, strategy of elimination.

But perhaps one of the most telling differences was revealed on March 21st, 2020.

This time, it was the Treasurer, Tim Pallas.

On this day, Pallas announced a`$1.7 billion economic survival and jobs package’.

Premier Andrews said: “We’ve listened to business and workers and now we’re taking unique and unprecedented action to help businesses and their workers through this crisis.”

Pallas said: “We’re working in lock-step with the Federal Government to make sure our support complements their work as we weather this unprecedented global economic storm.”

But just last month – Treasurer Pallas celebrated 38 new or increased taxes in the State Budget – including a $3.8 billion payroll tax levy on big business to pay for ‘mental health’.

Oh my. 

Victoria is a state now facing a $155 billion debt. We are not in ‘lock-step’ we are in ‘lockdown’.

The crisis we face is not a health one, it is a political one.

Three people are in hospital in Victoria today with coronavirus. Not one is in ICU.

There are 72 active cases of the virus in the state – clearly most are mild, though we are not told this.

Melbourne children are still not at school. Melbourne workers are not at work. Aged care residents are alone. Families are separated. Our hospitals are not loaded with COVID patients. Ambulances are ramping because sick people have delayed their medical attention during this ‘pandemic’.

Toilet paper is again in demand.

On average, 368 people die every day in Australia.

The last person to die of coronavirus in Victoria was on 30th November last year.

Why is it that we deal with every other health issue with common sense, but not this one?

And instead of only hearing about the number of positive cases each day, we need to know how many got tested, how many are negative, how many in ICU, how many on ventilators and the deaths along with any co-morbidity causes.

Because if the hospital beds aren’t overwhelmed, there is no need for a lockdown.  

We indeed need a circuit breaker.

We need it from the mad excesses, appalling incompetence and double-standards of this Labor Government in Victoria that is wreaking havoc in economic and human terms.

This lockdown is bad enough on a personal front.

But as Melbourne restaurant owner Chris Lucas told Sky News this week, on the economic front “…it’s not a circuit-breaker, this is a Chernobyl-style meltdown.”

The ‘proportion’ that this Government spoke about 452 days ago is a sick joke.

Victorians aren’t laughing.

Like the curve, they have been flattened.

Beverley McArthur is a member of the Victorian Legislative Council.