While there have been approximately 450 test positive cases in Australia the true number will be magnitudes greater than this.
Some estimates are up to 10 times greater.
It is very likely there are people with coronavirus in your school.
Even if you test negative to coronavirus there is still a good chance you may have coronavirus.
The doctor in his 30s who whistle-blew the disease from China tested negative 6 times before eventually testing positive – he is now dead.
Many people have no symptoms at all and will spread the disease.
Coronavirus stays active on hard surfaces for 2 to 3 days and is highly transmissible.
Just as people in the community can’t access toilet roll and sanitizer – Healthcare staff do not have adequate equipment to protect themselves from infection while caring for patients.
I’ve yet to see the hooded suits that are being worn in China – the virus attaches to hair and eyelashes. I work in one of the largest tertiary referral hospitals in Sydney and we have taken coronavirus patients.
Many healthcare staff will die because of increased viral load through repeated infection while trying to care for infected patients.
We continue on the same trajectory as Italy, Iran, Spain, France, US and the UK.
This occurs because aggressive interventions have not been implemented early enough.
Singapore got away without closing schools by implementing aggressive interventions early on – I will discuss these further.
New Zealand may also get away without needing to close schools or businesses – this is because their government closed their borders with only 6 reported cases and without interpersonal spread within the country.
Our government didn’t act quickly enough.
School Closure
It is vital all non-essential business locations close with immediate effect – work from home
Healthcare Staff in schools
It is important that schools close with immediate effect. The way they close is important – there will be students who genuinely can’t be cared for at home by healthy adult parents – ask for health teaching staff volunteers to care for them in school environment.
Economic Impact
No one usually wants to close businesses or schools and most will readily warm to any information which suggests we don’t need to.
Despite what the government wants you to believe school closure is an inevitability – we can either do it early – right now – if we do it right now it won’t need to be for as long and our economy will bounce back sooner – as has the Chinese economy.
Or we can do it too late and fall off the same cliff as Italy, France, Spain, US, UK.
Singapore
I just want to highlight the aggressive measures Singapore took early on:
Since the start of the outbreak thousands of people voluntarily self-isolated
For those who had come into contact with cases
Financial support for those who self-isolated
Please contrast this with Australia where we have a prime minister who refused to self-isolate or get tested after extensive contact with Peter Dutton and the message it sends to the general community.
For more information please read COVID19-EMERGENCY