In Western Australia we did hard border closure very early, this included doing regional area borders, Perth, Southern, Eastern and Northern and Far North, WA makes up 32.9% the land mass of Australia so a very large area. We were in hard lockdown for some 6 weeks, no travelling outside our area, no going out of our own homes except for Dr visits, essential shopping and exercise for 2hrs per day. We didn't have to wear masks however we did have to social distance. Tuesday and Thursday 7-9am was designated shopping time for all seniors. Telephone consults were set up for Dr appointment, if you needed a face to face appointment you had to wait in your car until your Dr called you in. Chemists did home deliveries as did the large supermarkets. After that initial phase we went from stage to stage fairly quickly with regional borders opening within the state. Local restaurants did home deliveries as well as meals for the needy. Some brewers diversified into producing sanitizer. It was surprising how many became very creative in keeping their businesses going. We had a total to date (15/3/21) of 924 covid cases with 9 deaths. Those were majority from travellers returning from overseas and cruise ships and a few export ships. Rottnest Island our top resort island was designated a quarantine zone. Cruise ships which were turned away from smaller countries to our north came and dropped anchor offshore with sick passengers were taken ashore and hospitalised here. Many return Australians were destined for the eastern states and were quarantined here. Western Australia was the only state in Australia not to go into recession with our economy increasing by 1.4% WA gross state product was A$260.6 billion or 14% of Australia's GDP making it the nation's most productive state with GSP per capita of A$100.367 compared with the national average of A$74,505. WA's economy has just been named the best in the world by S&P credit rating going from a A$3B deficit to an A$3B surplus during the pandemic. We've been very fortunate to be able to continue life pretty much as normal for some ten months, we've taken a lot of flack about our border closure, even with a challenge from an extremely rich eastern states mine owner who felt he should not be closed out, even our Prime Minister backed him until he realised our closed borders protected our big industry which was contributing to the economy, something no other state was to that extent, if COVID-19 affected our mining sector, a major financial resource for Australia, then economically Australia would have been in a much worse situation. The sad part for me, as a West Australian, is that, that information is not known to the other states and the reason I'm providing it here. We did the hard yards in the beginning, respected each other and that we were all in this together and our Premier backed us and has been rewarded for his efforts and standing up to ALL other Premiers, the Prime Minister, the media which opted not to tell the truth. It was the High Court which backed us and threw out the High Court challenge to WA and our closed borders.
Gloating over your economy is like a spoilt brat. You have 90% of Australia's Gas, Gold, Iron, Diamonds and Rare Earths. Of which Australia is in the Top 3 in most cases. WA and Alberta suffer rich brat's syndrome.
I'm not sure why you think other states didn't know about your Covid response. I think there was a lot of information flying around about the differences in responses from the different states, from the more isolationist orientation of the west to a greater reluctance to close down in NSW to the disaster in Victoria. Overall, we had more in common with each other than, it seems, most places in the world. Now, with some minor blemishes, most of the country is living a more normal life with all economies benefitting. I think there is a readiness to act decisively, by governments and people, if an outbreak occurs but I can't see us every getting as bad as in some parts of the world. Australia is a shining example of 'go hard, go early'. Way fewer people get sick, way fewer die and the economy is in the best position to rebound.
2:44 "A third of the population live rurally." This is completely wrong. I think the speaker is misreading the real statistic: "by 2016 two-thirds of the population (16 million) resided in the CAPITALS." That's from the Australian Bureau of Statistics, which goes on: "Australia is one of the world's most urbanised countries, with almost 90% of the country living in urban areas in 2016."
Correct. About 30% live outside of metropolises and capital cities on my count. Most of them with be in regional cities and towns - not rural. She says a very big country. This is true but it is largely populated like an archipelago, the east coast, Melbourne, Tasmania, Adelaide, Perth and Darwin.
an urban area does not have to be a capital. Geelong has 252,000 people and is not a capital. Similarly Newscastle, Woolongong and even the Gold Coast are not capitals. The definition of rural is similarly clouded.. The current Federal Government figure is 29% which is not a third but close enough in this case.
She’s got no idea about Australian demographics and how our population is largely concentrated in very specific urban areas (not sparsely spread across the continent). 🤦🏼♀️
Australia is one of the most urbanised countries in the world. The state capitals may have only 2/3rds of the population, but there's an urban sprawl surrounding them which could not be described as 'rural.
Yes , I notice some other glaring inaccuracies. If you go to a doctor in NSW , which is where most Australians live , you usually pay at his surgery , and then you will be refunded - but only 60 % Nowhere does anyone " just go to an office and get a refund ". Until about 2 years ago , General Practitioners would often 'bulk bill' , ie , they'd cover the other 40 % . You paid nothing . But these bulk billing deals have almost disappeared. In my opinion our excellent public health system has been under attack by right wing Neoliberal Coalition goverments , including the current one . That the taxpayers' dollars are used to subsidise rapacious private hospital operators , AND their billionaire friends in the health insurance industry -- is ugly in the extreme . Sounds to me just another case of the 'Old Boy' corruption in Australia , alive since the early days of Sydney Cove
I'm a Nurses living and working in Melbourne. I work in Aged Care and have done for 20+ years. Age Care has had it's problems for decades. It is underfunded, inadequately staffed. In particularly in Melbourne, the age care workforce is very transient and casualised or many are part-time workers on a day to day basis. Many age care workers in and around Melbourne work 2 or more jobs. ( This goes back to a long standing issue of no mandatory staffing levels in Age Care). The BIG impact on many Melbourne/VIC age care workers was the rule of working at a single site/facility during the lockdown. Though as soon as that rule was introduced, the covid cases, along with other measures, dropped in Aged Care. Though it highlighted that mandatory staffing levels and a stable workforce in age care are lacking. That's the federal governments failing. Daniel Andrews, the Premier of Victoria stepped-up and cleaned up the prime ministers messed....in my opinion.
Yeah aged and disability care has been an issue here for ages...there's a little more money now from the Commonwealth but still far short of what is required. Aged care packages once you get one aren't terribly bad I'll admit though, the issue is the time required to get , say, level 3 care to elderly home recipients.
Yes I agree with you. And on the COVID issue, as a Victorian, I am sooo grateful for the policies the Dan Andrews gov put in place to stop the spread and protect us, according to to expert health advice, and doing press conferences daily for weeks during that long lockdown. Imagine if the opposition was in power, COVID would be all over Australia! As for the federal government? I haven’t seen them do a thing
Aged care in Australia is the worst! It's bad in all states and the federal ministers do a really bad job at managing it..Both sides of govenment are just as bad as each other in this area, . I wish they would do better..listen to the long term staff members and their concerns and consider the issues they put forward.
I think it is generally true that the states did most of the heavy lifting -- and, to be fair, made some big mistakes -- and the feds are taking more than their share of the credit.
With Covid we have done well, not solely because of the policies of our Federal and State government, but also because we are, on the whole a law abiding, largely conformist people. We are also capable of stomaching pain, for community gain, with dissenters being more vocal than actual. The US is oriented more to the rights of the individual, over the rights of the group, the mentality is starkly different and it has impacted the capacity to control Covid.
@@triarb5790 I mostly agree, but I'd suggest 'collaborative' is a better word than 'conformist'. And I suggest a lot of that is due to the effect of the 'geography' on its culture, rather than mostly due to anyone's conscious decisions to make it that way. Let me explain: The USA consists mostly of rich arable land with lots of large predators, plenty of water and several major rivers that facilitate navigation. This sort of geography means the best way of thriving is to compete actively with each other. There's plenty of options to pursue and pioneer. But there are also things that want to kill and eat you: If you don't defend and challenge as an individual, you might not survive. Australia has a much smaller amount of arable land, only one large predator (and that only in the north), its wildlife can be dangerous but is usually smaller and not that aggressive, it has limited water and few significant rivers. That sort of geography means the best way to thrive is to collaborate actively with each other. It's not that the environment wants to kill and eat you, it's just that it doesn't care whether you survive or not. Of course that's a simplification, but if you look at the geography of any area it affects, even drives, what sort of culture it sustains. Even those that are city dwellers generations later are still affected by the atmosphere and stories generated from the nature of the land. Add to that various imported cultures and their effects (e.g. manifest destiny in the USA and Terra Nullius in Australia), and stir in the effects of key historical events and foundational myths, and you getting something like a national character. In this particular set of circumstances the Australian cultural approach seems to have given a good result. I could also say the same of New Zealand, Vietnam and several other countries. In a different set of challenging circumstances the opposite might occur. Each nation can learn things from the experience of others, but the solutions of some usually can't simply be transplanted directly to another and work the same way. None of this is in any way a criticism of the clip. It is evidence based, well presented and gives pretty good account of the events here. As indeed, one would expect from a person occupying such a position.
Agree with tri arb, whilst we do have our rabblers, by large we aussies are fairly law abiding bunch. We have a strong sense of “pull your head in, mate” when someone is being a d*k and impacting someone else negatively. Pull you head in is Aussie for “you’re being an arsehat, you need to stop”. But being an island in a big Ocean, and a functioning healthcare system, had a lot to do with it. Plus the whole government listening to medical experts thing...
Suzan, I have written an epic here, I hope you will read it to see that at the Federal level, all is not nice. In my piece, I have also suggested that people do not just take my word for what I have written. If they are willing to investigate my points, I think that they will find difficulty finding fault. I watched a youtube clip of a young woman arguing in an American cafe "I don't want to wear my mask those 5 feet till I get to my table, ... the poor lass waitress ended up quitting. Taking off the apron, taking off the hat, quitting!! all over arrogance of a snooty woman. So sad. The worst!!! After the waitress had walked out, shis bitch said, "oh well, I will wear it then" She destroyed the spirit of a worker just for her own hubris. So so sad.
6:24 Saying Australia "was a big island" and helpful is misleading. In this day and age of international air travel being a physical island has little bearing on the control of an pandemic. Australia has repatriated 200,000 from covid hotspots and it was policy, and not luck or distance from known sources, that stemmed the spread. In fact it was the failures at boarder control that caused the two largest outbreaks that contributed significantly to the total tolls.
Australia has a geographic advantage in that we have few and widely scattered, big cities, so the logistics of sealing off each major population centre from the others was easier than would be the case in much of Europe, North America, Asia. That being said, resolute and co-ordinated leadership at national, and state (ie provincial) level has been the difference. That, and a population willing to toe the line when persuaded.
Not sure about how important the geographical isolation is. The early cases came in boats and planes (and are still coming in planes). Melbourne's very serious outbreak was every bit as hard to control as with any other similar city in the world, but they got there. Australians are a cynical about governments as any and just as reluctant to 'toe the line', but for all their faults, no state or federal government turned Covid into a culture war and presented a relatively unified approach. I'm not so suprised at Australian's willingness to cooperate than I am at places like the US where saving lives seems to be less important that political partisanship. In fact, it's pretty mind boggling.
This is oddly Canberra centric in how it is presented, and Canberra never saw much Covid action. She doesn't answer the mask wearing question very well, or supply information on some of the techniques used in hospitals, or the innovative methods the Victorian government used to manage the 2nd wave spike there, or the social or cultural aspects.
@@GD_Fraser, the Commonwealth is responsible for the aged care system, not the states. Had the Commonwealth adequately financed the aged care sector by ensuring there was sufficient staff and that the staff only worked at one facility then there would have been fewer deaths.
As far as I know, dentistry is covered as essential healthcare in the UK, so getting braces for example is free I’m pretty sure, or at least affordable. In Australia it is not. Checkups and any required treatment is free for children 18 and under, but orthodontic work is not
The Dentists' union, the ADA threatened to bring down the original Medibank and the subsequent Medicare if any national health system was to include them. Similarly for Opthalmologists.
I feel so bad for Andrew's being blamed for a quarantine worker breaking the rules. He listened to the experts and was commended by the WHO for his actions. Even after the recent 5-day lockdown, it is the fastest-growing economy in Australia again. I don't know what people that attack him wanted him to do, he listened to federal governments recommendation on private quarantine workers and was denied army support. Well done to the majority of people in Victoria who did so well.
Victorian State Premier Andrews may be unjustly pilloried for the recent, mercifully limited, outbreak and 5-day lockdown in February 2021. But he can absolutely be blamed, and IMHO hasn't been blamed enough, for the debacle which afflicted Melbourne and Victoria in June-October 2020.
He was not denied army support at all. He refused it, because of his opposing political views to the federal government. You should feel sorry for all the lives he has ruined because of his arrogance.
Effective leadership should not be based on the absence of mistakes; it should be judged on the responses to mistakes! That applies especially concerning a virus that didn't give humans a handbook when it started spreading amongst us. On those grounds, I rate Andrew's leadership quite highly.
@@gusdrivinginaustralia6168 All countries that were settled have a brutal history. America is the same with the Native Americans. it was a brutal time back then..It's hard to judge it in current time while sipping late's and cappucino's..Put your history in context and move forward..
I'm Australian and was cringing at the long hauled history of Australia at the start. Do you really think the rest of the world gives a F about our history. Just get yo the point. But on serious matters our politicians did a great job keeping us safe with their lockdowns and covid tracing. Eouldnt want to be anywhere else apart for New Zealand who I actually think did a better job from the get go.
(and just a minor quibble) whenever an Australian refers to themselves as speaking from "down under", they aren't (Australian). Or at least, not Australian-born. For those of us born and raised here, the expression is some meaningless historical kow-tow, apologising for not being somewhere else.
Australians rarely use the term down-under. because to us, we're not. A very recent study placed a huge reason Australia has Covid under control to the compliance of the Australian people themselves. There are very few people who don't comply willingly. We know that what happens in a pandemic is dependent on all of us.
In Western Australia we did hard border closure very early, this included doing regional area borders, Perth, Southern, Eastern and Northern and Far North, WA makes up 32.9% the land mass of Australia so a very large area.
We were in hard lockdown for some 6 weeks, no travelling outside our area, no going out of our own homes except for Dr visits, essential shopping and exercise for 2hrs per day.
We didn't have to wear masks however we did have to social distance.
Tuesday and Thursday 7-9am was designated shopping time for all seniors.
Telephone consults were set up for Dr appointment, if you needed a face to face appointment you had to wait in your car until your Dr called you in. Chemists did home deliveries as did the large supermarkets.
After that initial phase we went from stage to stage fairly quickly with regional borders opening within the state.
Local restaurants did home deliveries as well as meals for the needy. Some brewers diversified into producing sanitizer. It was surprising how many became very creative in keeping their businesses going.
We had a total to date (15/3/21) of 924 covid cases with 9 deaths. Those were majority from travellers returning from overseas and cruise ships and a few export ships.
Rottnest Island our top resort island was designated a quarantine zone. Cruise ships which were turned away from smaller countries to our north came and dropped anchor offshore with sick passengers were taken ashore and hospitalised here. Many return Australians were destined for the eastern states and were quarantined here.
Western Australia was the only state in Australia not to go into recession with our economy increasing by 1.4%
WA gross state product was A$260.6 billion or 14% of Australia's GDP making it the nation's most productive state with GSP per capita of A$100.367 compared with the national average of A$74,505.
WA's economy has just been named the best in the world by S&P credit rating going from a A$3B deficit to an A$3B surplus during the pandemic.
We've been very fortunate to be able to continue life pretty much as normal for some ten months, we've taken a lot of flack about our border closure, even with a challenge from an extremely rich eastern states mine owner who felt he should not be closed out, even our Prime Minister backed him until he realised our closed borders protected our big industry which was contributing to the economy, something no other state was to that extent, if COVID-19 affected our mining sector, a major financial resource for Australia, then economically Australia would have been in a much worse situation.
The sad part for me, as a West Australian, is that, that information is not known to the other states and the reason I'm providing it here.
We did the hard yards in the beginning, respected each other and that we were all in this together and our Premier backed us and has been rewarded for his efforts and standing up to ALL other Premiers, the Prime Minister, the media which opted not to tell the truth. It was the High Court which backed us and threw out the High Court challenge to WA and our closed borders.
Gloating over your economy is like a spoilt brat. You have 90% of Australia's Gas, Gold, Iron, Diamonds and Rare Earths. Of which Australia is in the Top 3 in most cases. WA and Alberta suffer rich brat's syndrome.
I'm not sure why you think other states didn't know about your Covid response. I think there was a lot of information flying around about the differences in responses from the different states, from the more isolationist orientation of the west to a greater reluctance to close down in NSW to the disaster in Victoria. Overall, we had more in common with each other than, it seems, most places in the world. Now, with some minor blemishes, most of the country is living a more normal life with all economies benefitting. I think there is a readiness to act decisively, by governments and people, if an outbreak occurs but I can't see us every getting as bad as in some parts of the world. Australia is a shining example of 'go hard, go early'. Way fewer people get sick, way fewer die and the economy is in the best position to rebound.
2:44 "A third of the population live rurally."
This is completely wrong.
I think the speaker is misreading the real statistic: "by 2016 two-thirds of the population (16 million) resided in the CAPITALS." That's from the Australian Bureau of Statistics, which goes on: "Australia is one of the world's most urbanised countries, with almost 90% of the country living in urban areas in 2016."
Correct. About 30% live outside of metropolises and capital cities on my count. Most of them with be in regional cities and towns - not rural. She says a very big country. This is true but it is largely populated like an archipelago, the east coast, Melbourne, Tasmania, Adelaide, Perth and Darwin.
an urban area does not have to be a capital. Geelong has 252,000 people and is not a capital. Similarly Newscastle, Woolongong and even the Gold Coast are not capitals. The definition of rural is similarly clouded.. The current Federal Government figure is 29% which is not a third but close enough in this case.
She’s got no idea about Australian demographics and how our population is largely concentrated in very specific urban areas (not sparsely spread across the continent). 🤦🏼♀️
Australia is one of the most urbanised countries in the world. The state capitals may have only 2/3rds of the population, but there's an urban sprawl surrounding them which could not be described as 'rural.
Yes , I notice some other glaring inaccuracies. If you go to a doctor in NSW , which is where most Australians live , you usually pay at his surgery , and then you will be refunded - but only 60 % Nowhere does anyone " just go to an office and get a refund ".
Until about 2 years ago , General Practitioners would often 'bulk bill' , ie , they'd cover the other 40 % . You paid nothing . But these bulk billing deals have almost disappeared.
In my opinion our excellent public health system has been under attack by right wing Neoliberal Coalition goverments , including the current one .
That the taxpayers' dollars are used to subsidise rapacious private hospital operators , AND their billionaire friends in the health insurance industry -- is ugly in the extreme . Sounds to me just another case of the 'Old Boy' corruption in Australia , alive since the early days of Sydney Cove
I'm a Nurses living and working in Melbourne. I work in Aged Care and have done for 20+ years.
Age Care has had it's problems for decades. It is underfunded, inadequately staffed. In particularly in Melbourne, the age care workforce is very transient and casualised or many are part-time workers on a day to day basis. Many age care workers in and around Melbourne work 2 or more jobs. ( This goes back to a long standing issue of no mandatory staffing levels in Age Care).
The BIG impact on many Melbourne/VIC age care workers was the rule of working at a single site/facility during the lockdown. Though as soon as that rule was introduced, the covid cases, along with other measures, dropped in Aged Care. Though it highlighted that mandatory staffing levels and a stable workforce in age care are lacking. That's the federal governments failing.
Daniel Andrews, the Premier of Victoria stepped-up and cleaned up the prime ministers messed....in my opinion.
Yeah aged and disability care has been an issue here for ages...there's a little more money now from the Commonwealth but still far short of what is required. Aged care packages once you get one aren't terribly bad I'll admit though, the issue is the time required to get , say, level 3 care to elderly home recipients.
Yes I agree with you. And on the COVID issue, as a Victorian, I am sooo grateful for the policies the Dan Andrews gov put in place to stop the spread and protect us, according to to expert health advice, and doing press conferences daily for weeks during that long lockdown. Imagine if the opposition was in power, COVID would be all over Australia! As for the federal government? I haven’t seen them do a thing
Aged care in Australia is the worst! It's bad in all states and the federal ministers do a really bad job at managing it..Both sides of govenment are just as bad as each other in this area, . I wish they would do better..listen to the long term staff members and their concerns and consider the issues they put forward.
I think it is generally true that the states did most of the heavy lifting -- and, to be fair, made some big mistakes -- and the feds are taking more than their share of the credit.
Great job Australia! You show you care about your citizens and country.
With Covid we have done well, not solely because of the policies of our Federal and State government, but also because we are, on the whole a law abiding, largely conformist people. We are also capable of stomaching pain, for community gain, with dissenters being more vocal than actual. The US is oriented more to the rights of the individual, over the rights of the group, the mentality is starkly different and it has impacted the capacity to control Covid.
@@triarb5790 I mostly agree, but I'd suggest 'collaborative' is a better word than 'conformist'. And I suggest a lot of that is due to the effect of the 'geography' on its culture, rather than mostly due to anyone's conscious decisions to make it that way. Let me explain:
The USA consists mostly of rich arable land with lots of large predators, plenty of water and several major rivers that facilitate navigation. This sort of geography means the best way of thriving is to compete actively with each other. There's plenty of options to pursue and pioneer. But there are also things that want to kill and eat you: If you don't defend and challenge as an individual, you might not survive.
Australia has a much smaller amount of arable land, only one large predator (and that only in the north), its wildlife can be dangerous but is usually smaller and not that aggressive, it has limited water and few significant rivers. That sort of geography means the best way to thrive is to collaborate actively with each other. It's not that the environment wants to kill and eat you, it's just that it doesn't care whether you survive or not.
Of course that's a simplification, but if you look at the geography of any area it affects, even drives, what sort of culture it sustains. Even those that are city dwellers generations later are still affected by the atmosphere and stories generated from the nature of the land. Add to that various imported cultures and their effects (e.g. manifest destiny in the USA and Terra Nullius in Australia), and stir in the effects of key historical events and foundational myths, and you getting something like a national character.
In this particular set of circumstances the Australian cultural approach seems to have given a good result. I could also say the same of New Zealand, Vietnam and several other countries. In a different set of challenging circumstances the opposite might occur. Each nation can learn things from the experience of others, but the solutions of some usually can't simply be transplanted directly to another and work the same way.
None of this is in any way a criticism of the clip. It is evidence based, well presented and gives pretty good account of the events here. As indeed, one would expect from a person occupying such a position.
Agree with tri arb, whilst we do have our rabblers, by large we aussies are fairly law abiding bunch. We have a strong sense of “pull your head in, mate” when someone is being a d*k and impacting someone else negatively. Pull you head in is Aussie for “you’re being an arsehat, you need to stop”. But being an island in a big Ocean, and a functioning healthcare system, had a lot to do with it. Plus the whole government listening to medical experts thing...
Suzan, I have written an epic here, I hope you will read it to see that at the Federal level, all is not nice. In my piece, I have also suggested that people do not just take my word for what I have written. If they are willing to investigate my points, I think that they will find difficulty finding fault. I watched a youtube clip of a young woman arguing in an American cafe "I don't want to wear my mask those 5 feet till I get to my table, ... the poor lass waitress ended up quitting. Taking off the apron, taking off the hat, quitting!! all over arrogance of a snooty woman. So sad. The worst!!! After the waitress had walked out, shis bitch said, "oh well, I will wear it then" She destroyed the spirit of a worker just for her own hubris. So so sad.
@@tacitdionysus3220 Loved your comment, i had never thought of Australia in that way..good job and very accurate..👍
Born and in Canberra,I'm first generation of Canberran, my two nieces and my son's are second generation Canberran
6:24 Saying Australia "was a big island" and helpful is misleading. In this day and age of international air travel being a physical island has little bearing on the control of an pandemic. Australia has repatriated 200,000 from covid hotspots and it was policy, and not luck or distance from known sources, that stemmed the spread. In fact it was the failures at boarder control that caused the two largest outbreaks that contributed significantly to the total tolls.
Australia has a geographic advantage in that we have few and widely scattered, big cities, so the logistics of sealing off each major population centre from the others was easier than would be the case in much of Europe, North America, Asia.
That being said, resolute and co-ordinated leadership at national, and state (ie provincial) level has been the difference. That, and a population willing to toe the line when persuaded.
I live in Vietnam we have no geographical advantage, quite the opposite.... 2500_ cases, 35 deaths,, 95 million people
Not sure about how important the geographical isolation is. The early cases came in boats and planes (and are still coming in planes). Melbourne's very serious outbreak was every bit as hard to control as with any other similar city in the world, but they got there.
Australians are a cynical about governments as any and just as reluctant to 'toe the line', but for all their faults, no state or federal government turned Covid into a culture war and presented a relatively unified approach.
I'm not so suprised at Australian's willingness to cooperate than I am at places like the US where saving lives seems to be less important that political partisanship. In fact, it's pretty mind boggling.
Audio quality is poor but content is good
This is oddly Canberra centric in how it is presented, and Canberra never saw much Covid action. She doesn't answer the mask wearing question very well, or supply information on some of the techniques used in hospitals, or the innovative methods the Victorian government used to manage the 2nd wave spike there, or the social or cultural aspects.
Innovative way the Victorian Government managed to be responsible for 90% of COVID19 deaths FFS.
@@GD_Fraser, the Commonwealth is responsible for the aged care system, not the states. Had the Commonwealth adequately financed the aged care sector by ensuring there was sufficient staff and that the staff only worked at one facility then there would have been fewer deaths.
some info of interest but sound quality poor
I notice whenever we talk healthcare in Australia we seem to automatically exclude dental. Is that the same in the UK and US?
Yes, dental is usually a separate coverage.
@@healthwatchusa562 are dentists the ultimate union?
As far as I know, dentistry is covered as essential healthcare in the UK, so getting braces for example is free I’m pretty sure, or at least affordable. In Australia it is not. Checkups and any required treatment is free for children 18 and under, but orthodontic work is not
The Dentists' union, the ADA threatened to bring down the original Medibank and the subsequent Medicare if any national health system was to include them. Similarly for Opthalmologists.
I feel so bad for Andrew's being blamed for a quarantine worker breaking the rules. He listened to the experts and was commended by the WHO for his actions. Even after the recent 5-day lockdown, it is the fastest-growing economy in Australia again. I don't know what people that attack him wanted him to do, he listened to federal governments recommendation on private quarantine workers and was denied army support.
Well done to the majority of people in Victoria who did so well.
Victorian State Premier Andrews may be unjustly pilloried for the recent, mercifully limited, outbreak and 5-day lockdown in February 2021.
But he can absolutely be blamed, and IMHO hasn't been blamed enough, for the debacle which afflicted Melbourne and Victoria in June-October 2020.
The failures in Victoria were systemic in nature, not just due to a rogue employee.
The politicis of Rupert bloody Murdoch.
He was not denied army support at all. He refused it, because of his opposing political views to the federal government. You should feel sorry for all the lives he has ruined because of his arrogance.
Effective leadership should not be based on the absence of mistakes; it should be judged on the responses to mistakes! That applies especially concerning a virus that didn't give humans a handbook when it started spreading amongst us. On those grounds, I rate Andrew's leadership quite highly.
Very awkward history of Australia at the start 😬
Why?
Agreeing with Flowerpower *WHY?*
All I can see is a short intro to put Australia into context. 🤷♂️🤷♀️
@@flowerpower8722 mistreatment of the indigenous people.
@@gusdrivinginaustralia6168 All countries that were settled have a brutal history. America is the same with the Native Americans. it was a brutal time back then..It's hard to judge it in current time while sipping late's and cappucino's..Put your history in context and move forward..
@@gusdrivinginaustralia6168 Can you give the video timeline on that bit, I think i missed it.
I'm Australian and was cringing at the long hauled history of Australia at the start. Do you really think the rest of the world gives a F about our history. Just get yo the point. But on serious matters our politicians did a great job keeping us safe with their lockdowns and covid tracing. Eouldnt want to be anywhere else apart for New Zealand who I actually think did a better job from the get go.
Vietnam has done a better job than both Australia and NZ... glad I am living here
(and just a minor quibble) whenever an Australian refers to themselves as speaking from "down under", they aren't (Australian). Or at least, not Australian-born. For those of us born and raised here, the expression is some meaningless historical kow-tow, apologising for not being somewhere else.
Australians rarely use the term down-under. because to us, we're not.
A very recent study placed a huge reason Australia has Covid under control to the compliance of the Australian people themselves. There are very few people who don't comply willingly. We know that what happens in a pandemic is dependent on all of us.
True. We don't refer to ourselves as being from down under.
@@PrincessGold1 'Oath. Too much credit for the success Australia has had against covid so far has gone to authorities. It should go to communities.