12 days of Covid Christmas

Message from Australia

Written by Henry R. Greenfield Nov 1st

 Resident of Australia

Australia just recorded zero cases of CV19 again after a big spike last month in Melbourne? What can the US and the rest of the world learn from this? 

 What a shocker. 

•Masks work, contact tracing works, all residents doing the right thing works and then you don’t you     lose lives, jobs, the economy and you are less miserable. 

•Selective lockdowns work. 

•Closing borders work. By state and not just international. 

•Making all international flights that come in go into 14 day (no exception) hotel monitored quarantine, WORKS! 

After Covid disasters where some people decided they didn’t like quarantine, left isolation and became ‘superspreaders', killing a few hundred people and forcing a complete lockdown for the entire state of Victoria, Australia learned the hard way. If you are going to do something, be serious about it and do it right with no exceptions.

 Is all this difficult? Absolutely. Is it terribly inconvenient? Of course it is. But look at the results. It works, just as it did in Perth, where I live. We talked a good game but we didn’t stick with it and we lost big time so we had to double down and do it right.

 Let’s be clear. Many of us have gone through the quarantine, it is not fun. No one wants to be isolated where you cannot step outside the door of your hotel room for 14 days and you pay $3,000 for the privilege. But it saves lives, it works.

 LIFE IS NOW ALMOST NORMAL IN AUSTRALIA. We can go to church, we have, in most of the country, large gatherings, all the restaurants are open, we play sports and go Christmas shopping. We made our mistakes and we are opening up carefully and slowly. We still are wearing masks where necessary. We test test test and contact trace and wash our hands. 

 HERE IS THE LESSON FOR THE WORLD. It is not just small countries like New Zealand that can beat this virus. As I have written before, it is not a woman thing or a man thing or a young thing or an old thing, it is an everybody thing. If absolutely everyone adheres to the rules and the government takes the pandemic seriously, like I mean really seriously, then CV19 can be stopped in it's tracks.

 It has not been cured, just controlled. Travel is still virtually cut off from the rest of the world. You have to apply to get in and out of Australia. But we have our lives back, we are not dying in hundreds of thousands, 10s’ of thousands or hundreds not even 1 or 2. We are not dying anymore. 

 The answer to the Covid spread in the UK and Europe and other parts of the world, but especially the USA, is that your leadership is taking you down down down. You do not have to be China, you do not have to ‘give up your freedom’. You just have to pay attention and care about protecting others. You cannot play games with other people's lives or say it is over or you are rounding the curve when you have 100,000+ plus cases in one day like yesterday in the USA. You cannot go into denial and say, well they had other symptoms or the people who died were old, or the deaths were not reported fairly or it is all exaggerated. Really, come on! Open your eyes and ears. This is not some weird conspiracy.

 Dear USA and its citizens, the President of the USA could have stopped this. We did it in Australia so any country, of any size, can do it. He is lying to you. You are losing to China. We need you to wake up and get rid of that guy and rejoin the rest of the world. You matter, please understand that. Come on, you can do it. And tell all the ding dongs with the guns that seem to threaten anyone they don't like or anyone they don't understand, to cut it and go home and grow up. Your schtick is getting old, we don’t even laugh about it anymore. 

 Sincerely, The Rest of the World

Survivors

  

If you were born before there was a colored tv in every home, before frozen dinners, lasers, satellites, microwave ovens and before a man walked on the moon....you are a survivor.
If you arrived before computers, cell phones, smart watches, calculators and every other form of artificial intelligence that we substitute for our brains ….you are a survivor.
If you thought fast food was toast, a Big Mac was a truck, a meaningful relationship was learning to get along with your brother and time-sharing was spending the day with your kids ….you are a survivor.
If you believed that a microchip was a small french fry or a chunk of wood, hardware was bolts and doorknobs and software wasn't even a word, then, you my friend, are definitely an old school survivor.
 In your day, smoking was fashionable, grass was on the lawn and coke was a refreshing beverage on a hot day. Rock music was a lullaby and a gay person was just a happy guy or gal who was usually the life of the party. As for AIDS, they were prosthetics or wheelchairs for the handicapped or help for developing countries.
Yes, if you were born before identity theft was a real thing, and leaders were chosen from worthy people who had a long career of public service, not real-estate salesmen or tv celebrities, you are a member of a very hardy and long lived bunch who have survived the trials and tribulations of a mad and constantly changing world. Look at the amazing adjustments you have had to make.
Take the year 2020 for example: You become a prisoner in your own home, separated from friends and colleagues, keeping prescribed distances from all people. You have had to cover your face and clean your hands until they're raw and regard everyone and everything as carriers of a deadly virus. Did you let that defeat you ?? No, you are an old warrior. This strange and confusing time will end. You will adjust once again and continue to fight on.....You are a survivor.