There was movement at the station, for the word had passed around (Henry Lawson, 1895). No seriously. It was at Flinders Street Station. Hundreds had gathered after text messages had been sent around. People were going crazy. enjoying the opportunity to protest again. They seized the moment to attack, kick and throw bottles at police and destroy their cars. Some were setting off flares into the crowd. All of them were defying public health orders and they felt good about that. No masks. No social distancing. No coughing and sneezing into elbows. Others were chanting. ‘Freedom’. ‘No more lockdowns’, ‘sack Dan Andrews’. He’s the Premier of Victoria.
‘Go home idiots’
While all this was going on people who lived in the apartments overlooking this mayhem were shouting ‘Go home idiots’. The poor protesters hadn’t realised that the latest lockdown hadn’t even started. They could have been enjoying their last couple of hours of freedom enjoying drinks, last suppers or even a joint with friends. That’s what normal thinking people were doing. After all isn’t that what they were protesting about – freedom? But oh no! They were out potentially spreading a deadly virus and putting the whole population at risk. And through their actions, freedom looks less and less likely anytime soon.
And what started this insanity?
In the afternoon of Thursday 5 August, the Premier announced another lockdown was imminent. At 8 pm that evening Victoria began Lockdown #6. We had only little more than a week between Lockdowns 5 and 6. During that time a few new Covid cases of the Delta variant were being added to the daily tally. Authorities weren’t overly concerned because they were all related to current outbreaks But then two new mystery cases were detected and that ruined everything. Snap! We were in lockdown again.
Same old story
At first the lockdown was for a week. But as case numbers continued to grow each day everyone knew a week was not going to do it. So we’re now into the second week of the one week lockdown. The list of exposure sites has grown to over 500 and the case numbers continue to rise each day. There are now many mystery cases that are not linked to any known outbreak. On top of that, many people have been roaming about the community while infectious. This has really put the authorities on edge. Another week or two of this one week lockdown is inevitable.
We have company
But Victoria is not the only state in lockdown this time. We are joined by at least half of Australia’s population. New South Wales (NSW) has been in lockdown for over eight weeks with new infections rising above 450 every day. Canberra has now stepped up and gone into a seven day lock down after bragging about zero cases for over a year. South Australia and Queensland were also in lockdown but have now managed to ease restrictions. This whole mess involving millions of people happened because of the mismanagement of the virus in NSW.
You’re doing your best Gladys but
- Is it really OK to have a little family vacation in your holiday home when the rest of the state has been given ‘stay at home’ orders?
- Or go and do repairs at your holiday home?
- Is it OK to allow luxury goods shops to remain open?
So freedom is looking a long way off.
The following are the websites and Youtubes I referred to in this Blog Post.
Delta Variant
Canberra goes into Lockdown
https://www.covid19.act.gov.au/news-articles/seven-day-lockdown-for-the-act?SQ_VARIATION_1820035=0
Melbourne evening of Lockdown #6
And the feature image is from:
theguardian.com/australia-news/2021/aug/05/victoria-covid-update-snap-lockdown-being-considered-after-eight-new-cases-recorded
