Even "mild" cases of COVID-19 infection can last for months with distressing symptoms

The Guardian, 6 July 2020:

Conventional wisdom suggests that when a sickness is mild, it’s not too much to worry about. But if you’re taking comfort in World Health Organization reports that over 80% of global Covid-19 cases are mild or asymptomatic, think again. As virologists race to understand the biomechanics of Sars-CoV-2, one thing is becoming increasingly clear: even “mild” cases can be more complicated, dangerous and harder to shake than many first thought. 

Throughout the pandemic, a notion has persevered that people who have “mild” cases of Covid-19 and do not require an ICU stay or the use of a ventilator are spared from serious health repercussions. Just last week, Mike Pence, the US vice-president, claimed it’s “a good thing” that nearly half of the new Covid-19 cases surging in 16 states are young Americans, who are at less risk of becoming severely ill than their older counterparts. This kind of rhetoric would lead you to believe that the ordeal of “mildly infected” patients ends within two weeks of becoming ill, at which point they recover and everything goes back to normal. 

While that may be the case for some people who get Covid-19, emerging medical research as well as anecdotal evidence from recovery support groups suggest that many survivors of “mild” Covid-19 are not so lucky. They experience lasting side-effects, and doctors are still trying to understand the ramifications. 

Some of these side effects can be fatal. According to Dr Christopher Kellner, a professor of neurosurgery at Mount Sinai hospital in New York, “mild” cases of Covid-19 in which the patient was not hospitalized for the virus have been linked to blood clotting and severe strokes in people as young as 30. In May, Kellner told Healthline that Mount Sinai had implemented a plan to give anticoagulant drugs to people with Covid-19 to prevent the strokes they were seeing in “younger patients with no or mild symptoms”. 

Doctors now know that Covid-19 not only affects the lungs and blood, but kidneys, liver and brain – the last potentially resulting in chronic fatigue and depression, among other symptoms. Although the virus is not yet old enough for long-term effects on those organs to be well understood, they may manifest regardless of whether a patient ever required hospitalization, hindering their recovery process. 

Another troubling phenomenon now coming into focus is that of “long-haul” Covid-19 sufferers – people whose experience of the illness has lasted months. For a Dutch report published earlier this month (an excerpt is translated here) researchers surveyed 1,622 Covid-19 patients who had reported enduring symptoms; the patients, who had an average age of 53, reported intense fatigue (88%) persistent shortness of breath (75%) and chest pressure (45%). Ninety-one per cent of the patients weren’t hospitalized, suggesting they suffered these side-effects despite their cases of Covid-19 qualifying as “mild”. While 85% of the surveyed patients considered themselves generally healthy before having Covid-19, only 6% still did so one month or more after getting the virus. 

After being diagnosed with Covid-19, 26-year-old Fiona Lowenstein experienced a long, difficult and nonlinear recovery first-hand. Lowenstein became sick on 17 March, and was briefly hospitalized for fever, cough and shortness of breath. Doctors advised she return to the hospital if those symptoms worsened – but something else happened instead. “I experienced this whole slew of new symptoms: sinus pain, sore throat, really severe gastrointestinal issues,” she told me. “I was having diarrhea every time I ate. I lost a lot of weight, which made me weak, a lot of fatigue, headaches, loss of sense of smell …” 

By the time she felt mostly better, it was mid-May, although some of her symptoms still routinely re-emerge, she says. 

“It’s almost like a blow to your ego to be in your 20s and healthy and active, and get hit with this thing and think you’re going to get better and you’re going to be OK. And then have it really not pan out that way,” says Lowenstein. 

Unable to find information about what she was experiencing, and wondering if more people were going through a similarly prolonged recovery, Lowenstein created The Body Politic Slack-channel support group, a forum that now counts more than 5,600 members – most of whom were not hospitalized for their illness, yet have been feeling sick for months after their initial flu-like respiratory symptoms subsided. According to an internal survey within the group, members – the vast majority of whom are under 50 – have experienced symptoms including facial paralysis, seizures, hearing and vision loss, headaches, memory loss, diarrhea, serious weight loss and more. 

“To me, and I think most people, the definition of ‘mild’, passed down from the WHO and other authorities, meant any case that didn’t require hospitalization at all, that anyone who wasn’t hospitalized was just going to have a small cold and could take care of it at home,” Hannah Davis, an author of a patient-led survey of Body Politic members, told me. “From my point of view, this has been a really harmful narrative and absolutely has misinformed the public. It both prohibits people from taking relevant information into account when deciding their personal risk levels, and it prevents the long-haulers from getting the help they need.” 

At this stage, when medical professionals and the public alike are learning about Covid-19 as the pandemic unfolds, it’s important to keep in mind how little we truly know about this vastly complicated disease – and to listen to the experiences of survivors, especially those whose recoveries have been neither quick nor straightforward. 

It may be reassuring to describe the majority of Covid-19 cases as “mild” – but perhaps that term isn’t as accurate as we hoped.

COVID-19 restrictions to be tightened in NSW from Friday 24 July 2020

NSW Government, media release, 17 March 2020:

The NSW Government will tighten COVID-19 restrictions around “higher risk” activities as the pandemic enters a new phase of community transmission.
 

From 12:01am Friday, 24 July 2020 the following rules will be in force as NSW enters a state of ‘COVID normal’. 

• Compliance measures introduced to pubs will be extended to restaurants, bars cafés and clubs. This includes:
  1. limiting group bookings to a maximum of 10 people
  2. mandatory COVID-Safe plans and registration as a COVID-Safe business
  3. a digital record must be created within 24 hours.
• Weddings and corporate events will be limited to 150 people subject to the four square metre rule and registration as a COVID-Safe business. Strict COVID-Safe plans must be in place and high-risk activities including choirs and dancing must not occur.
• Funerals and places of worship will be limited to 100 people, subject to the one person per four square metre rule and a COVID-Safe business registration.

The rules on gatherings remain the same: 20 guests inside the home and 20 for gatherings in a public place. However, as the home is a high transmission area, the NSW Chief Health Officer strongly recommends a COVID-Safe precautionary approach of limiting visitors to the home to 10 people as a general principle. 

Premier Gladys Berejiklian said this tightening was to reduce the risk of uncontrollable break-outs and ensure NSW stays open for business. 

“Unfortunately we must live with COVID-19 and the way it has changed our lives,” Ms Berejiklian said.

“These rules will give businesses and the community a degree of certainty into the foreseeable future, and help NSW avoid uncontrolled virus spread.”

Deputy Premier John Barilaro said the NSW Government continues to work with business and industry to ensure they operate in a COVID-Safe way.

“These measures apply across the state and will also work to protect residents in rural and regional NSW,” Mr Barilaro said.

Health Minister Brad Hazzard said the changes are based on advice received from the Chief Health Officer Dr Kerry Chant.

“We do not want to see community transmission getting to a stage where it is out of control. These restrictions target large gatherings which are high risk settings for transmission of the virus,” Mr Hazzard said.

“We need people to do the right thing: follow the rules; stay home if unwell and get tested, even with the most minimal of symptoms; always maintain physical distancing when out and about; and ensure good hand hygiene.”

Minister for Customer Service Victor Dominello said the new rules will be strictly enforced to protect the wider community.

“Venues should be on notice – NSW Police, Liquor & Gaming inspectors and NSW Health officials are carrying out inspections across the state to ensure COVID-Safe plans are being followed,” Mr Dominello said.

Chief Health Officer Dr Kerry Chant said with a heightened risk of COVID-19 outbreaks, the people of NSW need to be on high alert.

“This is the time to be vigilant – we need people to come forward and be tested even if they have the mildest of symptoms, we need businesses to follow and enforce their COVID-Safe plans and we need people to follow the rules,” Dr Chant said.

COVID-19 has returned to the NSW Northern Rivers after 48 days free of active infection

Northern NSW Local Health District, media release, 16 July 2020:

One case of COVID-19 has been confirmed in the last 24 hours in the Northern NSW Local Health District (NNSWLHD). 

This brings the total cases to 56, as at 8pm Wednesday, 15 July. 

The new case is a person who travelled to Northern NSW from Melbourne, arriving at Ballina airport on Sunday, 12 July on Jetstar flight JQ466. This person was screened on arrival at Ballina airport. 

Since arriving in Northern NSW, this person has been in mandatory 14-day self-isolation. 

Any potential close contacts are being followed up. 

Of the 56 cases in Northern NSW Local Health District, 53 have recovered. There are no cases being treated in hospital. 

NNSWLHD cases by likely source of infection: 

Overseas or interstate acquired – 52 
Locally acquired –contact of a confirmed case or in a known cluster – 2 Locally acquired – source not identified – 1 
Under investigation – 1 
Total 56 

NNSWLHD is encouraging anyone with symptoms, however mild, to self-isolate and get tested. Anyone with symptoms is also advised to refrain from visiting aged care facilities and hospitals. Everyone is also reminded to maintain physical distancing and hand hygiene. 

Anyone who is unable to practise physical distancing should wear a mask. 

More than 4,900 people have been tested during the last fortnight in NNSWLHD. 

Testing is free and available to everyone in the region, including visitors. The site locations are/can be found at: https://nnswlhd.health.nsw.gov.au/about/covid-19-clinic-information/

Australia During Pandemic 2020: Portraits in Selfishness & Self-interest

Crikey, 13 July 2020:

FLIGHT CENTRE FOUNDER GRAHAM TURNER
(IMAGE: AAP/LUKAS COCH)

For some business leaders and lobby groups, the return to lockdown in Melbourne is intolerable. The most prominent is the Australian Industry Group (AIG).

Last week it condemned the Melbourne lockdown, saying “widespread shutdowns is a strategy that can be used just once.” The following day it called for the reopening of the NSW-Victorian border on the basis that the Melbourne lockdown — which it had opposed the previous day — had removed any threat of community transmission of COVID-19 outside Victoria.

The carefully chosen words of last week, though, were replaced by an altogether harsher view articulated by AIG head Innes Willox to The Australian over the weekend.

State premiers, Willox complained, were trying “to outdo, outbid and outrace each other to smother any chance of economic recovery” — a couple of days after Queensland had reopened its borders.

“Putting up artificial barriers, closing borders and turning Australians against each other is not going to get us there.”

That coincided with the head of Flight Centre, Graham “Skroo” Turner calling for Australia to “learn to live with the virus”, which would get “society and business back to a reasonable level of normality”.

After dismissing herd immunity, and the tens of thousands of deaths that would require, as “not a great option”, Turner, or his ghost-writer, suggested that Australia had embraced a “model of states, territories or governments who have no COVID-19 objectives or clear science and data-based strategies”.

Despite complaining about this alleged lack of clear objectives and strategies, it wasn’t clear what Turner’s “living with the virus” meant beyond “containment by proven health and hygiene practices, widespread testing and tracing but without hard lockdown.” Unsurprisingly for the head of a travel company, Turner wants international borders and tourism reopened as soon as possible. The Australian backed Turner in an editorial.

Turner’s “strategy” would amount to letting the virus rip, with contact tracers — let alone hospitals — rapidly overwhelmed. That’s exactly the scenario that is unfolding in places like Florida and Texas right now. Funnily enough, that’s not very good for consumer sentiment, even without hard lockdowns….. [my yellow highlighting]

Read full article here.

CEO OF THE AUSTRALIAN INDUSTRY GROUP INNES WILLOX
(IMAGE: AAP/LUKAS COCH)

The New Daily, 13 July 2020:

A group of six Victorians has been fined more than $24,000 after trying to cross the border into Queensland in a minivan. 

The group, who had lied on their border declaration forms, told police patrolling entry the state’s points that they had been working in NSW for three weeks. 

However, evidence on their phones revealed they had been in coronavirus hotspots in Victoria during the past 14 days. 

“Police intercepted a minivan on Saturday night, where all six occupants were refused entry at the M1 border control check point,” Queensland Police said. 

“On Sunday, officers intercepted the same van on Stuart Street in Coolangatta around 2pm.” 

All six in the group – two 19-year-old women and four men aged 18, 19, 23 and 28 – were fined $4,003 for failing to comply border directions and turned around immediately....

myPolice on Jul 13, 2020

NSW Police, 13 July 2020:

A man has been fined after failing to follow self-isolation ministerial directions in the state’s south west. 
 At 2.30pm on Wednesday 8 July 2020, a 24-year-old man was stopped by police on the Newell Highway at Tocumwal, as part of border enforcement patrols. 

The man was issued a direction under the Public Health Act to self-quarantine for a period of 14 days and was provided with information before being allowed to leave. 

Officers from Murrumbidgee Police District attended the man’s home in Leeton at 12pm and again at 4pm on Thursday 9 July 2020, and found the man was not home as directed in the orders. 

Police attended the home again at 5.30pm and provided the man with a formal warning in relation to self-isolation. 

About 8pm on Friday 10 July 2020, police attended the man’s home and again found he was not home. 

About 4.20pm yesterday (Sunday 12 July 2020), police attended the man’s home and issued him with a $1000 Penalty Infringement Notice (PIN) for failing to comply with a direction under Section 7 of the Public Health Act 2010 (NSW). 

Since Operation Border Closure started at midnight on Wednesday 8 July 2020, police have facilitated the movement of tens of thousands of vehicles crossing the border from Victoria into NSW. 

To date, more than 300 people have been issued with directions to self-isolate as they enter NSW.....

Enhanced border controls for Queensland, New South Wales & ACT

COVID-19 travel restrictions currently in place on east coast of the Australian mainland.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 
Enhanced border controls to enter Queensland are now in place.

Queensland Border Declaration Pass available online 
myPolice on Jul 3, 2020 @ 12:30pm 

The online portal enabling members of the public to apply for the Queensland Border Declaration Pass is now live. The completed declaration is a requirement for everyone including Queensland residents who are returning to Queensland as of midday on Friday, July 3. 

State Disaster Coordinator Deputy Commissioner Steve Gollschewski said previous border entry passes into Queensland would be invalid from midday. 

“Each person travelling must have a completed Queensland Border Declaration Pass and those travelling by road need to have one clearly displayed within their vehicle to enable priority passage,” 

Deputy Commissioner Gollschewski said. “They must also carry identification which show a residential address. 

“The Queensland Border Declaration Pass is a print-at-home document and issued following the completion of an online questionnaire. 

“It is everyone’s responsibility to understand and listen to the Queensland public health directions and follow them closely, including those who intend to travel into Queensland from other states. 

“Border restrictions apply to all travel to Queensland by air, sea, rail or road. 

“Police will conduct random interceptions of those progressing through priority passage to ensure the validity of declarations.” 

 Anyone coming to Queensland who has been in Victoria or another hotspot within the last 14 days will be required to quarantine in a designated hotel at their own cost. 

This includes Queenslanders returning home from Victoria or other hotspot areas. 

Failure to comply with quarantine directions and border restrictions can result in on-the-spot fines of $1,334 for individuals and $6,672 for corporations. 

Providing false information on the declaration or entering Queensland unlawfully could result in a $4,003 fine. 

The Queensland Entry Declaration can be accessed at www.qld.gov.au/border-pass and is valid for seven days.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

New South Wales border protections are also now in place.

NSW and Victorian border closures
NSW Government 8 July 2020

Temporary border restrictions now include: 

• road closures between the NSW and Victorian border 
• aircrafts travelling from Victoria and arriving into NSW airports will be met by police and health staff 
• NSW residents returning home from Victoria must self-isolate for 14 days. 

Anyone who fails to comply with the rules could face up to six months prison, a fine of $11,000, or both. 

There will be limited exemptions for people allowed to cross the border. 

This includes: 

• critical service providers including agriculture and mining workers 
• emergency services workers 
• people requiring medical treatment 
• children attending boarding school people needing to meet legal obligations. 

Anyone who needs to enter NSW must apply for a permit from Service NSW.  
A new on-the-spot fine of $4000 will apply for any inaccurate information provided in the permit application process. 

Those allowed to enter NSW will need to comply with any conditions of an entry permit including self-isolation. 

Health Minister Brad Hazzard said the NSW Government has moved quickly to implement the border closure following the concerning community spread of COVID-19 in Melbourne. 

“There are around 55 border crossings between NSW and Victoria so closing the border is a mammoth task – but it is the right step to take in order to protect the health and jobs of NSW residents,” Mr Hazzard said. 

Learn more about the NSW border restrictions.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The Australian Capital Territory has imposed ehanced border restrictions.

Public Health Directions for people travelling from Victoria 
ACT Government 12 July 2020

In response to the escalating COVID-19 situation in Victoria, a new Public Health Direction came into effect at 7:00am on Friday 3 July 2020. 

This Direction has been revised as the situation in Victoria has continued to evolve. 

From 07:00am on Friday 3 July 2020: 

• Anyone who enters the ACT, and has been in a COVID-19 hotspot in Victoria (as defined at the time of their entry to the ACT), is required to quarantine in the ACT until 14 days after leaving the hotspot, or return to their home jurisdiction at the earliest reasonable opportunity. 

• From 11:59pm on Monday 6 July 2020: Anyone who enters the ACT, and has been in the greater Melbourne metropolitan area, is required to quarantine in the ACT until 14 days after leaving Melbourne, or return to their home jurisdiction at the earliest reasonable opportunity. 

• 12:01am Wednesday 8 July 2020: Anyone (other than ACT residents) travelling into the ACT from Victoria will be denied entry unless they are granted an exemption. ACT residents will be able to return home, but they will be required to enter quarantine until 14 days after leaving Victoria, and must notify ACT Health of their intention to return. 

From 12.01am on Wednesday 8 July 2020, the ACT has closed its borders for anyone travelling into the ACT from Victoria, unless they have an exemption to enter. 

ACT residents are approved to return to their home, subject to entering quarantine for a period of 14 days, from the day after leaving Victoria. 

ACT residents must notify ACT Health of their intention to enter the ACT.

Both adults and children are required to get an exemption to travel from Victoria to ACT. 

Your exemption paperwork will indicate if you need to quarantine for 14 days, and we may impose other conditions or restrictions. In most instances, if you're arriving into the ACT from Victoria you will need to quarantine for 14 days. 

If you plan to quarantine at a private residence, it needs to allow for appropriate separation from other household members who are not in quarantine. Household members in quarantine would ideally have a separate bedroom, bathroom and should avoid spending time in communal spaces at the same time as other people in the home who are not in quarantine. If this can’t be done you will be required to quarantine in a hotel or other approved premises. ACT Health can assist in providing details of suitable accommodation which you can book (at your own expense). Please note that we will require evidence of a valid booking if you are using hotel accommodation for quarantine purposes.

For ACT residents returning from Victoria 

All ACT residents returning from Victoria will be required to enter quarantine for a period of 14 days from the day after leaving Victoria. 

All returning ACT residents must notify ACT Health of their intent to return to the ACT and provide details of the premises at which they will quarantine. 

Notify ACT Health 

For other travellers from Victoria to the ACT All other travellers from Victoria to the ACT should not be travelling. If you have an exceptional need to travel to the ACT, you will need to apply for an exemption at least 48 hours (wherever possible) before your intended travel date. 

Persons trying to enter the ACT without an exemption will be denied entry. 

If you are granted an exemption to enter the Territory, ACT Health will assess your proposed length of stay in the ACT as part of its risk assessment. 

A condition of entry may be that you will be required to remain in the ACT to complete a full 14 day period of quarantine in the ACT (at your own expense). We will consult with individuals on a case by case basis.

Apply for an exemption

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Scott Morrison admits to being on holiday on the day an elderly Victorian man died from COVID-19 infection

Sometime around 5 July 2020 Australian Prime Minister & MP for Cook Scott Morrison began a planned fortnight's holiday.

Like his holiday trip to Hawaii during some of the worst days of the 2019-20 bushfire season, he did not announce his plans.

Indeed this time he went to some lengths to disguise his absence by doing a phone interview on 2GB radio which was aired in the early evening of 6 July.

However, as press releases are a poor substitute he had to return to Canberra and show his face on 9 July because social media had begun to comment negatively on his absence.

On 10 July he again fronted the media where he admitted that he will be at his holiday retreat for the next week and will conduct any government business from there via phone, email or video conferencing.

This two-day return to work over he went back to "Jenny and the girls".

On 11 July now he was openly holidaying he decided to attend a football match at Kogarah, where he didn't wear a mask or practice social distancing but did scoff a beer or two or three or......

Something which I'm sure impressed those living south of the Murray River - especially the millions of Melburnians suddenly in COVID-19 lockdown due to a surge in infection numbers, as well as the familes of an elderly Victorian man in his 90s who died sometime on 10 July and a Victorian man in his 70s who died sometime during the night of 11 July after succumbing to this serious disease.

Morrison returns to Canberra at the end of this week ahead of the government's update on the economic and fiscal outlook on Thursday, 23 July 2020. On that Thursday he is also expected to announce how many people will be losing the JobKeeper wage subsidy by the end of September.

* Images found on Twitter,  Daily Mail Online & @rami_ykmour

Has our dream run over the coronavirus pandemic has come to a sticky end?

Echo NetDaily, June 2020:

Thus Spake Mungo: ahh the Spike

Australia awoke last week to the strains of Spike Milligan’s poignant refrain, ‘I’m walking backwards to Christmas.’

It may not be all the way to Christmas, but it could be even further – well into next year, and perhaps beyond that. We don’t know and we can’t tell.

But it is sadly clear that our dream run over the coronavirus pandemic has come to a sticky end. And it has happened on both fronts, the medical and the economic. The cluster of hot spots that emerged from Victoria does not yet constitute the dreaded second wave, but it is worrying, and defies explanation.

For readers of The Australian, of course, it is all too simple: Daniel Andrews unleashed the beast by not clamping down on the Black Lives Matter protests. But hang on – there were protests in other states as well, without clusters emerging, And in any case, not one of the cases in Victoria can be traced to the demonstrations.

So perhaps the problem was that Andrews mismanaged the Cedar Bay abattoir outbreak? Or ignored communicating COVID-19 information to the ethnic communities? One way or another, we have to blame the socialist totalitarian for something.

But apart from the partisan bullshit, the fact that there are clusters at all must serve as a warning, because across other parts, around the world, COVID–19 is still raging. It is out of control in Brazil, spreading dangerously in India, working its way through the southern United States and, most disturbingly, making huge inroads in parts of China, where it was thought to have been tamed......

And for the government, the worse news is that the easing of restrictions has not just stalled, but has been reversed in some areas, notably the urgency of opening state boundaries.And despite the predictions of the optimists, we are not yet in reach of a vaccine. This is not good news.

It appears that we are reverting to the old maxim: think globally, act locally. The national cabinet was never much more national than our mish-mash federation, or the constitution that birthed it; it was a useful conceit and helped us muddle through the early emergency, but it was always gesture politics rather than reality....

And now the premiers have declared that it is every state for itself. Some are derestricting like mad, others are more cautious, playing for time. And of course Victoria has gone backwards – even toilet paper is back on the rationing list. This is serious, folks......

And it appears that the other premiers are less than sympathetic. In NSW, Gladys Berejiklian has made it clear that Victorian holidaymakers will not be welcome in her pristine domain – in fact, she has bluntly told them to bugger off.

Australia is still doing fairly well by world standards. Moody’s rating agency and the International Monetary Fund have both offered commendation, ticking us off as one of the best in a fairly miserable bunch.

But the IMF have warned that shutting down the stimulus measures designed to dampen unemployment too abruptly could lead to awful consequences – it has urged caution; a gradual easing, rather than a sudden shut off.

Morrison and Josh Frydenberg seem, reluctantly, to be getting the message. The strictly temporary JobKeeker program, scheduled to end in September, may have to be extended, at least for the most vulnerable sectors of the economy.

And some extra spending is being rolled out; the beleaguered arts are finally getting a boost, although a very minor one, and in the wake of the Qantas stand down, assistance for the airline industry is on the table.

And Morrison is hell-bent on ramping up the nation for business – whatever the consequences. ‘We can’t go “stop, go, stop, go”, we can’t flick the light on and off,’ he insisted, blithely ignoring the fact that this is precisely what he is planning to do with JobKeeker. ‘We’ve got to just keep the focus on keeping the economy open and getting people back into jobs.’ And there is absolutely no need for anxiety about the Victorian outbreak, because ‘we were expecting it.’ Perhaps he was – the rest of us were somewhat taken aback. 

But it is still all about industry and business. Individuals – casual workers in particular – are not considered essential. And of course enemies are still to be punished. The universities, and most of all the ABC, have been singled out for clobbering. Some of us are in this together more than others.

But it’s time to forget about the health crisis – so 2019-2020, We need a new narrative to turn the page into the new financial year. It’s the economy, stupid – and we do mean stupid. Back to Spike Milligan. As the Great Goon might have warbled:

‘I’ve tried walking backwards

And walking to the front

But all the people stare at me

And ask: who is that silly…’

Yes, quite so. Moving right along…

Become a supporter - donate now.

Charities are warning Tweed Heads is a food insecurity hotspot and they are running out of supplies to meet rapidly growing demand.

ABC News,  June 2020:

Charities are warning Tweed Heads is a food insecurity hotspot and they are running out of supplies to meet rapidly growing demand. 

Agape Outreach founder Theresa Mitchell said the number of people asking for food assistance has almost doubled since the advent of coronavirus. 

"Before COVID we were feeding up to 400 people a week, now we're feeding up to 700," she said. 

"We are getting 1,600-1,700 kilograms of food donated a week, but we can go through 700kg a day. 

"A run we did last week we had 150 hot meals. We didn't get halfway through the places we were going to. We bought $100 of pizza on top and we still had to turn people away." 

Tweed region facing unique challenges 

Agape services the stretch between the northern Gold Coast and Byron Bay, where Ms Mitchell said all communities were experiencing increased hardship as a result of coronavirus job losses. 

Food recovery charity OzHarvest is making hot meals

Tweed, however, has few big businesses to provide major chunks of funding and faces unique accessibility issues with pockets of population dotted in remote areas. 

"There are a lot of people who can't get here [to access food] because of lack of funds to do that," Ms Mitchell said. 

"Every person walking in the door would ask us for a petrol voucher but we're not funded, we don't get money from everywhere, so we can't give them." 

Demand becoming unsustainable 

The Gold Coast manager of food rescue organisation OzHarvest, Sally Anderson, said servicing Tweed's growing demand is unsustainable. OzHarvest figures show that in May 9,299kg of food was delivered to the nine charities it supports in Tweed Heads, but less than a third of it was contributed by donors from that area. 

"That identifies to us that Tweed donors would never be able to fill the demand of the food relief that is required by the charities down there," Ms Anderson said. 

"We make up the rest by donating Gold Coast food that we have collected to meet that food demand down at the Tweed end. 

"We are all a community, regardless of whether there is a border there or not, but in the next 12 months we will be facing some tough times. 

"Tweed really needs some attention so we would love it if we could get some support down there and we are trying to connect with local businesses."

The Morrison Government's COVIDSafe app has not identified any close contacts of a person infected with coronavirus who had not already been found through manual contact tracing

The Sydney Morning Herald, 28 June 2020:

The federal government's COVIDSafe app has not identified any close contacts of a person infected with coronavirus who had not already been found through manual contact tracing, despite being downloaded by more than 6 million Australians in two months. 

As the number of infections soars in Victoria, Centre Alliance senator Rex Patrick said the government was being dishonest about the effectiveness of the app, which Prime Minister Scott Morrison touted as "sunscreen" against major outbreaks and as the key to lifting restrictions..... 

The $2 million app — downloaded more than 6.44 million times and launched amid the height of the pandemic in Australia on April 26 — was built to help assist state and territory contact-tracing teams uncover close contacts of infected COVID-19 cases who may have been within 1.5 metres of them for more than 15 minutes in public places such as restaurants, cafes or shops. 

But testing data provided to the Senate showed its effectiveness, particularly on Apple iPhones, remains an ongoing issue. The testing data, released to the Senate's select committee on COVID-19, shows when an iPhone is locked there remain issues with the app detecting another nearby iPhone user. 

Only 25 to 50 per cent of the time did it work on May 26 in locked iPhone-to-iPhone testing. At launch, it was worse, working only 25 per cent of the time or less for locked iPhone to locked iPhone. When it was running in the background, the app also didn't work well. Issues were also prevalent on Android smartphones, with problems remaining on May 26, especially when the app's testers tried to get iPhones and Androids to share information. 

At the app's launch, Government Services Minister Stuart Robert said: "To be effective, users should have the app running in the background when they are coming into contact with others. Your phone does not need to be unlocked for the app to work." 

Labor's government services spokesman Bill Shorten accused the government of being "secretive" about the app's dysfunction. "The current app is clearly not working well enough and the government is being secretive about how often it has actually made a difference," Mr Shorten said..... 

On the app's launch day, 6696 Australians had coronavirus. Since then, a further 926 cases have been identified, many returned travellers. Of the 926, only 40 of those have had the COVIDSafe app and have allowed health officials to look at their close contact data..... 

On Wednesday, Victoria's Chief Health Officer Brett Sutton said his contact tracers had downloaded the app's data 30 times but had not identified anyone who wasn't already uncovered through the manual interview process..... 

Federal Health Minister Greg Hunt revealed on Thursday that NSW health officials had downloaded people's contact data from the app 10 times. 

But the NSW Health Department confirmed on Saturday no contacts or cases had been identified using the app.....