The Doherty Institute modelling, which showed how intensive care units would be quickly overwhelmed if social distancing measures were not implemented, made no reference to a potential 150,000 deaths or of 60 per cent of the population becoming infected.
While the Doherty Institute's modelling warned 70 per cent of patients needing an ICU bed could be turned away without social distancing measures, on Wednesday just 30 COVID-19 patients were in hospital, with six in intensive care and only three on ventilators - while the government has more than doubled the nation's ventilator capacity to 7500.
Professor Jodie McVernon from the Doherty Institute said the modelling was based on the assumption that "only fairly modest levels of social restriction to reduce transmission would be achievable in Australia".
We should just be very grateful that we didn’t end up like the US and UK. In my opinion we acted quickly and that kept us safe.
More die each year from the flu.
People Listening To The Science From Unbiased Health Experts, State Premiers Taking Decisive Action. Shutting Down Was The Right Call But Political Ideology Resulted In Poor Support From Federal Government And Their Drive To Return To Business As Usual. Seeing The Folly In This
The deaths were predicted based on certain actions not happening. Would have thought this was pretty obvious.
It was a win for listening to experts and acting. Now do climate change!
Australia acted to prevent deaths and it worked. I don’t get what the issue is here
Epidemiologists say that an appropriate response to a pandemic should look like an overreaction.
It doesn't matter. The deaths were prevented.
Australia went hard and fairly early. I'm eternally grateful for this when you look at the USA, Brazil and UK. We just need to stay vigilant. Having low numbers means the economy is in a much better position.
Can you at least pretend your readers have a decent level of intelligence and world knowledge?
Instead of musing out aloud, how about *reporting* from experts? auspol
Is this a serious question? You just have to cast your eyes overseas to understand what Australia has achieved
What the actual 🦆? Wow. SMH
Daily mail fountain of all knowledge, & the seeker of truth & justice
This is a ridiculous thing to say. Typical sh1t stirring always negative media
Modelled by the same government that modelled the budget and missed by $60 billion.
Dangerous and outrageous headlining. We dodged a big bullet through a well funded, comprehensive public health response, that was driven by state governments, acting under the advice of excellent public health experts.
Poor modelling Excellent response It wasn’t either it was all the SMH and other media hype
Our response
Though the start of restrictions was delayed! Together have nailed it! Proud moment! Wish we all follow, all the precautions like earlier till have vaccines! Stay Safe !
Stupid article
Australia's response has been proportionate. It's saved lives.
This story is irresponsible and dangerous.
That’s a pretty dumb question. You just have to look at the US or Brazil to get the answer.
I would have thought it’s pretty simple. The less people come in contact with each other, the less likely it is to spread. It’s all well and good to now say it’s poor modelling. Have people not seen what’s happening in Brazil- which once had similar numbers to Australia l?
Didnt someone say there would be fking morons whining 'We went harder than we needed 2' or some such twaddle, once we took action (lock down, social d'ing) had success?You're a dense motherfkr 2 not realise if we hadnt taken action it wouldve been as bad as everywhere else 🙄🙄
You idiots would have prefered it happened
Every model is wrong, some are useful.
It could have ended like the USA. So, ...
Stupid tweet - our response stopped the result overseas . I respect journalists asking questions and keeping everyone to account but don’t write something which implies we over reacted when you can see the result of other countries ignoring medical advice .
🙄. Seriously, a Country acts to avoid the worst case scenario and fortunately pulls it off (so far) and you then criticise the model as being ‘wrong’. You’d rather be the US or Italy?
Everyone went hard and did their bit. We could have been like US where modelling suggested 100k by August, yet here we are in May and they've already surpassed 100k.
It was prevention.
Response
Same old same old 🙄
Look at the US if you want to know what would have happened if we hadn’t locked down.
I cannot believe some the 'professorial' responses. Our low infection and death rates are because we went hard on social distancing and lockdown auspol professorpantsdown
Why even ask the question honestly SMH how do I cancel my subscription?
How about it's because we did it the correct way. Look at UK and USA, that should be enough.
Trump said there would be 15 deaths in the US tops!
The headline should be 'Australia listened to scientists and oh look it worked'
For years now, we've been screaming at our leaders to listen to the scientists … Doh!
This says it was the timing that avoided the modelled outcomes, we acted early enough. 'If the US had locked down two weeks earlier than it did in late March and early April, 82% of its cases and 84% of its deaths could've been avoided'
One Economist's opinion vs Epidemiologists ? NO CONTEST. That's like asking a Psychiatrist to judge the work of a Neurologist. It's time for journalism to catch up with the complex knowledge of the 21st century and ditch its black and white version of reality.
FFS! Thousands expected to get polio, but they didn't! Poor modeling? The medical advice worked! Seriously are any of you real.jounos?
Wanted more click bait? We did good. That's the story.
Who suggests doing such a ridiculous piece? The Australian people took matters in our own hands,
Not sure you can question modelling, or even need modelling when you can look at the US and Europe to justify action taken
this is irresponsible. We are ok BECAUSE we took all those precautions. Just look at the mess elsewhere. That's like saying, did we all over-react by banning people from driving when drunk given the low incidence of drunk driver deaths since the ban
To many Karen's overreacting
Prudent to plan for the worst with funds ready if needed.
We’ve done really well and the Federal/State Governments have won back some credibility after handling the bush fires so badly. BUT we’re not out of the woods. Complacency will undo all the good we’ve done. 1 person bought this to us, there are still 400+ active cases. Stay safe
The fact that in reality we're a very large and except for a couple of exceptions a sparesly populated island, was probably not factored in to said modelling
By the shocking death results in the USA, UK, EU & South American countries our fantastic result is due to Australia's coordinated quick action & Australian's taking the advices & lockdown seriously. Australian's trust their medical profession & coordinated action. Same as HIV.
Sure, should’ve let all those people die, then we can have a one sided discussion here - ‘why did the gov do nothin’.... ppl who said it’s not a big deal because it wasn’t their family or friends who had to die, sure they would be happier if their parents or grannies die from it
As jacindaardern NZ receives praise for her handling of the covid pandemic, Australia cops criticism of being too restrictive bec 103 deaths are so low. Perhaps those criticising would be happier with Sweden:herd immunity:pop 10M; inf 35,088; deaths 4,220 or curr ~100 per day
Quick stop to flights and border closures, restriction of travel and vast reduction in physical contacts led to prevention of deaths and it will now be possible to have a recovery, though fight is not over, more testing needed of anyone who wants a test & of all who have symptoms
Poor modelling?! What a fktard question.
It was a fast wonderful and positive response of Aust, in spite of economic hit, which prevented thousands of deaths. Well done Australia.
was it poor modelling &/or the response of the so called 'leaders' within the political class & technocrat executive corporates & so called 'expert' academic () monkey managers now in plain sight flushed out as undisclosed agents of their oligarch organ grinder pay masters !!
Pandemic is not finished in Australia stay vigilant and alert especially on overseas arrivals.
Diddums, feel like you’ve missed out? 😭 Why don’t you spend some time in the Top 10 countries? Then you can bring back some click-bait headlines. PS Thanks for reminding me why I cancelled my SMH subscription just before the election, due to cr4p, biased reporting!
Quality response resulted in far fewer deaths. Had we not responded we can see from places like Belgium what it would have looked like.
Oh look. Here’s Latvia’s Public Health Advice Warnung of places not to go. Looks like Sweden who didn’t have a hard lock down, didn’t trace, test or isolate is top of the list. Wonder how that’s working for their economy? auspol swedencoronavirus
Do the math indeed!
This should teach us how unreliable modelling can be. It is now time to run a jaundiced eye over climate modelling, it is probably just as unreliable.
We all knew this ridiculous debate would happen. If deaths soared, we did too little. If deaths remained low, we ‘overreacted’. Can’t win. It’s not over yet, quite the opposite in fact, so how about we wait, watch, act accordingly and then have a good pow-wow this time next year?
Gigi Foster has utterly zero credibility! It is difficult to comprehend the sheer idiocy of her thinking! What would she be saying if we had 10000 deaths! Would she say, “that’s just collateral damage to save the economy”? Or would she say, “the government did not act”?
The science and facts never supported the model. Yes do the maths. This was OH&S running our country and destroying our already fragile population ponzi economy. Still on the upside let’s build bakc better and toss out immediately any leaders who don’t get it
Poor leadership. Never let your OH&S department run a country or a business....that is of course when you’re in the business of politics and not leadership. Time to build back better and learn from the mistakes
Take a look at Trump's America 'it's a hoax', 'it's just the flu' and look what happened. For once the government got something RIGHT, don't knock it.
The state premiers drove the response with Morrison kicking and screaming . and then Morrison enforced Pauline Hanson and the LNP in Melbourne to discredit our premiers
Ridiculous modelling and a complete over reaction in the media.
Clickbait. Replace the headline with “thousands of predicted COVID-19 deaths never eventuated - how Australians & our response made the impossible happen”
very typical of liberal and muckturd Murdoch shock and scare mongering and evil lying sensationalism , I am so happy I have cancelled his vile lies and rubbish and unfounded paranoia
So Gigi Foster thinks there should have been more deaths for the economy. 3000 years ago, she was the woman screaming to sacrifice another 10 babies because that would make the gods really love us.
Officially the end of what was once a great newspaper in the country. I’m done with SMH.
Every case came from overseas so should have been obvious that closing and quarantining our borders would stop the virus in its tracks
Oh sorry not enough people died for you to be happy with the modelling.
Prepare for the worst and count your blessings for the best. Without controls it would have been a human catastrophe. It's also not over yet and complacency is a harsh competitor.
very costly modeling We had to kill the economy to save few geriatrics
Just reading the comments, Australia is fast becoming a country of whingers. Thank god I live in Australia we came thru the health crisis and we will get thru the economic crisis this is a bit of a motherhood statement but we need to work together to get thru this crisis
Short answer - Brazil. America. Russia. The end.
Both.
Would love to see the death / injury numbers due to self harm as a result of once again poor modelling where the impact of the cure is never considered, only the tunnel vision of the modelling
What a shitty tweet subject. How about .... Thousands less died than modelling indicated. Great result.
bencubby Australia dodged a bullet. Thankfully as an island nation with a modern healthcare system we were able to identify overseas visitors and quarantine them more effectively. But it could have been so much worse.
Well Sweden did nothing and they didn’t achieve the catastrophic forecast either. Acknowledge they have a higher death rate, but it was winter where increased deaths are expected. Another fizzer, led by a hysterical media and left wing populous.
You are no better than the foreign owned rag newscorp pushing this same gatbage
Flu deaths in 2018-19 USA were 34,000. Covid has killed 100,000 in three months. Ineffective lockdown, poor testing, no coordinated response. Modelling predictions will change if the parameters for the modelling change eg movements restrictions, increased hygiene etc.
We could have easily been a USA. With relatively few cases the ability to contact trace is powerful. Even delaying the response a handful of days lates may have blunted that tool & forced us to simply treat cases as they occurred. A tipping point to wide community transmission.
The modelling didn't overestimate the risk; 'Rather it underestimated society's ability to respond and prevent transmission'. The institute was not asked to model how the virus would spread under the lockdown measures put in place after it was drawn up
These are the kinds of media reports that bring all the dumbest people into the open. Again. The initial forecast was if Australians did nothing. The fact that lockdowns, social distancing, hand washing etc were implemented is why the numbers of deaths are low. FFS
Do you even need to ask seriously!! The response without question look at here and NZ compared to US Brazil Sweden etc ! No wonder Hanson Murdoch’s twerps etc are off on a tangent with articles like this
I believe the government decided to sacrifice the livelihoods of a few for the greater good.
Poor modeling! It’s a scam Incase you didn’t know it!🙄
This is garbage
It’s a shame more people haven’t died... The privilege of even being able to write an article like this 🙄
Modelling........A bit like the Climate change modelling?
A bit of both. Being the worlds biggest nanny state and an island also helped.
“Some experts”? “UNSW Business School professor of economics” is not an expert in the subject being discussed!
WINTER IS COMING The weathers changing and flue season is almost here.
Just look at countries without such restrictions, UK, USA. Wait until our restrictions are lifted to see what happens.
If anything it was the media scaremongering, the Australian media has been at their very worst through this crisis scaring the hell out of the public just to keep people viewing watching and reading. Any enquiry should include their role and especially the ABC public service
Not out of the woods until a vaccine is found. It’s too early to elaborate on anything.
Compare us to a country without lockdowns. Then decide whether you would rather be in London, Sweden Brazil or sydney. Then ring your Still living grandparents and say hello. And enjoy what was achieved in spite of people like Gigi
The ''model' was voodoo done based on a fake flu outbreak based on Spanish flu and if only the stupid media had asked or checked the guys record they would have ignored it and not trashed the country over such deranged nonsense. Locking up healthy pple is demented
Poor modelling was fueled by hysteria from the media. There are still tens of thousands of people that still believe thousands will die here due to what the media did.
So how many actual virologists and epidemiologists who specialise in pandemics were actually quoted in the article? None. Maybe one? But well done quoting an academic whose area is business because yeah they have a great understanding of how viruses like this work 😳
So, steps were taken and the worst scenario didn't eventuate? Not a surprise. It's like saying being vaccinated against measles was an inconvenience and a waste of time because you didn't get the measles.
Dear Lord, what idiocy. 50,000 people in the UK; 100,000 dead in the US. Do the maths instead of trying for clickbait.
May 28 Deaths per million population % USA 306 Spain 580 Italy 547 UK 552 Australia 4 Thank U PM Morrison for acting early 9 days before the World Health Organization
Of course it was a bit of both, but the modelling was dodgy and the response was arbitrary, heavy-handed and made up on the run. The important thing is to learn from this for a rational, measured, systematic response for the next time.
ABC said we all be dead right now, they must be really upset. Not that they made a fool of themselves, but because we are alive
Yet
Australia Latest News, Australia Headlines
Similar News:You can also read news stories similar to this one that we have collected from other news sources.
Source: abcnews - 🏆 5. / 83 Read more »
Source: SBSNews - 🏆 3. / 89 Read more »
Source: newscomauHQ - 🏆 9. / 77 Read more »
How coronavirus can spread on public transportGraphic visualisations show just how easily coronavirus can spread and move through the air in confined spaces. 9News Fearmongering FakeNewsAlert I call bullshit 9. Your un Australian why don’t you do some real reporting & look after your country
Source: 9NewsAUS - 🏆 10. / 72 Read more »
Source: smh - 🏆 6. / 80 Read more »
Source: SBSNews - 🏆 3. / 89 Read more »