Experts say that Victoria’s failure to meet its roadmap goals points to a “stupid” strategy to eliminate the virus.Victoria

Epidemiologists and other experts say that Victoria has “apparently failed” to reach its deregulation roadmap goal, which has little to do with the recognized weaknesses of contact tracing systems. States.

Professor Tony Blakely, an epidemiologist at the University of Melbourne, said the goal of the roadmap is 3rd and last step to resume Despite repeatedly saying that suppression, not elimination, is the state’s strategy, Daniel Andrews effectively demanded the elimination of the virus.

“The Victorian roadmap has two last steps to take when eliminating. [is your goal]”Breakley said. “We obviously couldn’t get there. That’s a shame. But the point here is that the Department of Health and Human Services in Victoria had the goal of trying to get over the virus completely. That’s it. Hopefully … Eliminate community infections.

“The incident is happening again in New South Wales, and NSW does not believe that a long-term elimination of community infections is possible, which, given Victoria’s current location, would eliminate it. It’s hard to work towards. At – a stubborn tail. ”

He said it now makes sense to pivot towards a policy of safe opening, which means clusters keep popping up, but Victoria’s contact tracing exceeds the numbers for NSW. I was in a position to emulate success.

“New South Wales is doing incredibly well,” said Blakely.

“Daily indicators of contact tracing in Victoria suggest that we are currently on par. But let’s be clear. Safe opening provides a bumpy ride up to vaccination. It means. Even if contact tracing is exemplary, we will definitely happen between now and in the meantime. “

Professor Bruce Thompson, an epidemiologist and dean of health sciences at Swinburne University, has improved Victoria’s contact tracking system, installed local hubs throughout the state instead of the central system, and overhauled IT systems. We have quick questions and regular check-in with close contacts in the cluster.

However, it was important to remember that Victoria still had four times as many active cases as New South Wales, with many long-term uncontrolled regional infections. He said it wasn’t just the number of clusters and new cases every day.

“If we’re down to the level of 26 active cases that NSW has, we can of course handle this better, but when no other state did, there were thousands of active cases. Don’t forget that, “he said. .. “That’s what we’re cleaning up for a while. There were 400 people in Covid’s hospital. If there are so many in the community … it’s hard to counteract. And we’re actively looking for it.”

In Victoria, 15 new virus cases were recorded on Monday, 12 on Sunday, and 14 on Saturday. There were 11 mysterious cases in the 14 days until October 9.Andrews said on Monday that the government is likely to change thresholds for deregulating big cities. MelbourneInitially, the state needed to reach an average of 5 cases in 14 days, at which point there were less than 5 mystery cases.

“Stubborn tails, the last few incidents, one or two outbreaks, and a sudden moving average … make it very difficult to get to where we wanted,” Andrews said.

His comment came as the hospitality person Julian Garner Prepare to launch a legal objection to the blockade, including a 5 km limit, Companies are still facing uncertainty about when they can reopen. “We are seriously concerned about the fact that we do not have a concrete plan to guide retailers into the resumption process,” said Paul Zara, chief executive officer of the Australian Retailers Association.

But deregulation announced on Monday “will be more widespread in social space than economic easing, but Victoria could do more in that regard,” Andrews said on Monday.

Thompson said the 5 km rule should be restricted first, given the “small impact” of controlling the spread of the virus, and that state borders that restrict domestic travel need to go as well. I will.

“It’s not a good idea to fill the MCG and really bring 100,000 people closer and squeeze people into public transport and the workplace,” he said. “But do everything you can to minimize the numbers and start opening. Keep social distance, maintain good contact tracing, and come down to the cluster like a ton of bricks. Brick. “

Professor Catherine Bennett, director of epidemiology at Deakin University, said the stubbornness of the virus in Victoria may also be related to the nature of its outbreak compared to New South Wales.

“Chadstone is now Victoria’s main driver and appears to have a proband, but there seems to have been considerable indiscriminate exposure at Chadstone, which complicates follow-up and makes follow-up more complicated. There is more risk. Linked cases that are not visibly linked, “she said.