Overseas Situation Report Monday 5th July 2021
By Mike Evans
“Life will not always be bitter, sometimes it will be sour, sweet and even tasteless. You just have to allow yourself savour every moment with the accompanying taste.” – Unknown
The world has come to hear of the “Delta” variant in the past few weeks as it is spreading across the globe. In this report, I am highlighting some of the stories surrounding this variant and what countries are trying to do to combat its spread to the population.
Firstly, we look at Sydney, Australia.
The country has been lauded for the way it has handled the pandemic, although some feel that the draconian measures of lockdown and closing down of the country to even residents overseas are too much for a democratic country. They were one of the first countries to use the policy of “Zero” Covid. It meant locking down early and isolating those with the virus for as long as it takes. This proved very successful at the start and they continued to use this strategy until the end of July 2020, when they decided to pursue a new line.
This was all about the vaccine and would lead to opening up the country again. However, the country has been slow to vaccinate and now the Delta variant is starting to outpace the vaccinations. There are signs that the virus is spreading despite the countries’ best efforts.
Three days after the emergence of a rare Covid-19 case in Sydney, around 40 friends gathered for a birthday party. Along with cake and laughter, there was a hidden threat: one of the guests had unknowingly crossed paths with that single Covid case, an airport driver who had caught the Delta variant from an American aircrew.
Two weeks later, 27 people from the party have tested positive, including a 2-year-old child, along with 14 close contacts. And the seven people at the gathering who were not infected? They were all vaccinated.
The party points to the immense challenge Australia now faces to its wildly successful policy of total Covid suppression. In a simple suburban setting, the vaccines and the highly contagious Delta variant went head-to-head, and because too few Australians have been immunized, the virus spread.
For Australia and every other nation pursuing a so-called “Covid Zero” approach, including China and New Zealand, the gathering in western Sydney amounts to a warning: Absent of blanket vaccinations, the fortress cannot hold without ever more painful restrictions.
According to Catherine Bennett, the Chair of Epidemiology at Deakin University in Melbourne. “This is the beginning of the end of Covid Zero. We may be able to get it under control this time, but it’s just going to be harder and harder.” The Delta mutation has already raced from Sydney across Australia, carried on flights and by people visiting schools, hospitals, hair salons and a mass vaccination hub. Half of the country’s 25 million people have been ordered to stay home as the caseload, now at around 200, grows every day. State borders are closed, and exasperation – another lockdown 16 months into the pandemic? – is intensifying.
It’s a sudden turn in a country that has spent most of the past year celebrating a remarkable achievement. With closed borders, widespread testing and efficient tracing, Australia has quashed every previous outbreak, even as almost every other country has lived with the virus’s unceasing presence, often catastrophically.
In Australia, no one has died from Covid-19 in all of 2021. While most capital cities in the world sheltered last year from a viral onslaught, Sydney and most of the country enjoyed full stadiums, restaurants, classrooms and theatres with “Hamilton.” That experience of normalcy – diminished only by a lack of overseas travel, occasional mask mandates and snap lockdowns – is what Australian politicians, from Prime Minister, Scott Morrison, to local officials, are so desperate to defend. To them, keeping Covid out, whatever it takes, remains a winning policy. Last Friday, Australia doubled down on this approach, announcing that the trickle of a few thousand international arrivals allowed each week (and quarantined) would be cut by half.
Australia shut its borders to international arrivals for a year and opened up later than the rest of the world. This time around, most Australians were willing to accept isolation again, assuming it would keep them safe. Until Delta.
Now, public officials are scrambling to counter a variant they have labelled a ‘formidable foe’, as if it were a Marvel villain.
Contact tracers have found video footage showing one case of transmission in a Sydney department store, when the man who started the outbreak simply walked by someone else. Delivery drivers have also passed on the virus with brief interactions, and health officials have warned that, in most households, one person with Delta typically leads to infection for everyone. The variant has forced officials to move faster and harder with restrictions than before.
New South Wales avoided a full lockdown during previous Covid outbreaks, including a cluster last December that was curbed with three weeks of suburb-specific restrictions. This time, Gladys Berejiklian, the State Premier, tried a similar tactic, but found that Delta moved too quickly to be contained.
The variant is now in over 95 countries according to the WHO and is becoming the dominant virus.
In China, officials announced that they planned to build a giant quarantine centre in Guangzhou with 5,000 rooms to hold international travellers, due to come into use in September.
Across the globe, countries are racing against time to vaccinate their populations, with plans to reopen after lengthy lockdowns at risk. On Wednesday, France lifted its strict “deconfinement” after weeks of closures, granting the country a semblance of normality. All restrictions on theatres, cinemas, museums and sports venues were lifted on Wednesday, along with a return to full capacity in restaurants. In a boost for tourism, ports will also reopen to cruises and the Cannes Film Festival is gearing up to return in July.
Health experts warn that despite vaccinating more than 40 percent of its population with at least one dose, France may not be spared another spike in infections as the delta variant rages.
The French government’s Chief Scientific Adviser, Jean-François Delfraissy, warned on Wednesday that France could face a fourth coronavirus wave this year, likely because of the Delta variant, which was first identified in India and now represents about 20 percent of cases in France.
If that happens, the government has said that it may need to reimpose regional restrictions, French Health Minister, Olivier Veran. told French radio on Tuesday.
Russia reported 669 coronavirus-related deaths nationwide on Wednesday, the most confirmed in a single day since the pandemic began, amid a surge in cases that authorities blame on the Delta variant. Moscow is pushing reluctant residents to get vaccinated.
In South Korea, which also had relative success in stemming outbreaks, the government is now finding that new control measures are necessary. Authorities said they would delay by a week the relaxation of social distancing rules in the capital, Seoul, and its neighbouring regions, due to a sudden increase in cases.
South Korea has inoculated close to 30 percent of its 52 million population with at least one dose of a Covid-19 vaccine.
Even secretive North Korea, which has never openly confirmed the existence of Covid-19 cases, saw leader Kim Jong Un this week chastise ruling party officials for failures in anti-epidemic work, that led to an unspecified “great crisis,” state media reported on Wednesday.
Meanwhile South Africa on Sunday extended a nightly curfew and introduced a ban on gatherings, alcohol sales, indoor dining and some domestic travel for 14 days, to halt a worrying surge in cases driven by the Delta variant, President Cyril Ramaphosa said.
In Bangladesh, the government pointed to a “dangerous and alarming” rise in Delta-related infections and halted all public transportation starting Monday, prompting thousands of migrant workers to flee the capital, Dhaka, before the restrictions took hold.
Thai authorities declared a month-long limited lockdown in the capital, Bangkok, and neighbouring provinces, amid a spike in new cases attributed to the Delta variant. Also, Malaysia extended a nationwide shutdown that was scheduled to be relaxed on Monday.
In Taiwan, which reported its first Delta case on Saturday, the local Centres for Disease Control announced new restrictions for people arriving from seven “high-risk countries”: Bangladesh, Britain, Brazil, India, Indonesia, Israel and Peru.
Hong Kong also said on Monday that it was banning all passenger flights from Britain beginning later this week, because of the growing number of new coronavirus cases and the “widespread Delta variant virus strain there,”
With more and more countries becoming aware of this new variant, it looks as though we are going to have to try and live with this for some time to come.
In the meantime, Stay Safe.
Total Cases Worldwide – 184,579,138
Total Deaths Worldwide – 3,993,651
Total Recovered Worldwide – 168,929,141
Total Active Cases Worldwide – 11,656,346 (6.3% of the total cases)
Total Closed Cases Worldwide – 172,22,792
Information and resources:
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2021/06/28/coronavirus-latest-updates/