The Australian Plan

Australia takes the courage of it's convictions US Half a billion free at home lateral flow tests Military (1,000) helping hospitals The omicron virus spread more rapidly than anyone thought Texas One omicron death Man in his 50s Underlying health conditions Unvaccinated Australia https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/australia-rules-out-lockdowns-despite-omicron-surge-2021-12-21/ NSW, cases + 3,763 Victoria, cases + 1,503 Australian thinking To stop omicron with vaccination, near 100% efficacy with near 100% uptake With no waning Natural infection promotes antibody IgA (vaccines generate IgM then IgG Preventing vial replication in the upper airways Allowing omicron infection up to the point where hospitalisations are manageable Less pathogenic with shorter hospital stays Natural immunity giving cross immunity to the next variant Concurrent booster programme for the elderly and comorbid Over time need for pharmaceutical and NPIs will diminish If hospitalisations do rise, population will self-titrate https://www.doherty.edu.au/our-work/institute-themes/viral-infectious-diseases/covid-19/covid-19-modelling/modelling Millions of Covid cases by the end of January or early February Infections, + 200,000 per day Up to 4,000 hospitalisations a day PM Mr Morrison The modelling assumed the Omicron strain is as serious as Delta Failed to account for boosters or people taking sensible behavioural responses in what they're doing So I wouldn't want to alarm people over that report. That is not what we are actually expecting to happen The grim predictions were highly unlikely There is a range of scenarios, of course the number of Omicron cases will increase. It's highly infectious. But the indications are that it is not as severe and our hospitals, in NSW and Victoria, have been coping extremely well Professor Paul Kelly, Australia chief medical officer https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10333919/Coronavirus-Australia-Australias-Chief-Medical-Officer-hits-doomsday-Omicron-predictions.html selective and misleading media reporting about ongoing modelling the predicted hospitalisation estimations are unlikely. Evidence about the characteristics of Omicron is still emerging but early trends seen both internationally and within Australia suggest that it is more transmissible However, early indications around hospitalisation, ICU admission and death show that Omicron could be far less than Delta and other variants Importantly, after almost four weeks of Omicron in Australia there are currently no confirmed Omicron cases in ICU and no deaths confirmed to date Modelling, it's one of a range of tools and can't be viewed in isolation A preliminary scenario, of many being considered to help inform decision making Presents one of the worst case of all potential scenarios including assumptions that the Omicron variant is as severe as the Delta variant, an absence of hospital surge capacity, a highly limited booster program, no change to baseline public health and social measures and an absence of spontaneous behaviour change in the face of rising case numbers None of these five assumptions represent the likely state of events, let alone all of them together, therefore presenting that scenario as the likely scenario that will occur is highly misleading Former deputy chief health officer Nick Coatsworth Whoever leaked the Doherty modelling without context has committed a gross injustice to the Australian people Federal Health Minister Greg Hunt Despite the rapid spread of Omicron only a fraction of cases were ending up in hospitals SA hospital data https://www.nicd.ac.za/diseases-a-z-index/disease-index-covid-19/surveillance-reports/daily-hospital-surveillance-datcov-report/ UK data https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/covid-19-om Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices