/r/CoronavirusDownunder
This subreddit is a place to share news, information, resources, and support that relate to the novel coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 and the disease it causes called COVID-19. The primary focus of this sub is to actively monitor the situation in Australia and New Zealand, but all posts on international news and other virus-related topics are welcome, to the extent they are beneficial in keeping those down under informed.
Welcome!
This subreddit is a place to share news, information, resources, and support that relate to the novel coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 and the disease it causes called COVID-19. The primary focus of this sub is to actively monitor COVID-19 in Australia, but all posts on international news and other virus-related topics are welcome, to the extent they are beneficial in keeping those in Australia well informed. We are a community that values free speech as long as it does not break the sub and/or Reddit rules.
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/r/CoronavirusDownunder
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Weekly case numbers from around Australia: 4,620 new cases (🔺17%)
- NSW 1,756 new cases (🔺20%)
- VIC 1,187 new cases (🔺12%) ^(see note)
- QLD 864 new cases (🔺1%) ^(see note)
- WA 370 new cases (🔺142%) ^(see note)
- SA 258 new cases (🔺1%) ^(see note)
- TAS 70 new cases (🔻26%)
- ACT 72 new cases (🔺33%)
- NT 43 new cases (🔺79%)
These numbers suggest a national estimate of 92K to 140K new cases this week or 0.4 to 0.5% of the population (1 in 225 people).
This gives a 50% chance that at least 1 person in a group of 156 being infected with covid this week.
Notes
- Victoria didn't report anything this week. Cases are based on the increase in residential aged care cases but this is fairly stale data.
- SA dashboard is reporting that cases are up 12% to 274 cases, suggesting last weeks numbers had a small data dump in them.
- QLD is seeing a slight increase in hospitalisations, although cases seem stable. There appears to be a small number of aged care outbreaks, (possibly related to the elections?), and this is likely driving up the hospitalisations. FluTracker has indicated a small rise in flu cases.
- WA wastewater was not indicating an increase in covid levels as of 25 Oct, so there is likely a small data dump in these numbers.
Flu tracker tracks cold and flu symptoms (fever plus cough) and is another useful tool for tracking the level of respiratory viruses in the community. This increased to 1.3% (🔺0.3%) for the week to Sunday and suggests 338K infections (1 in 77 people). This is on par with the seasonal average.
- NSW: 1% (🔺0.1%)
- VIC: 1.3% (🔺0.4%)
- QLD: 1.8% (🔺0.8%)
- WA: 1.1% (NC)
- SA: 1.2% (NC)
- TAS: 1.4% (🔺0.4%)
- ACT: 2.6% (🔺1.4%)
- NT: 0.5% (NC)
Based on the testing data provided, this suggests around 127K new symptomatic covid cases this week (0.5% or 1 in 205 people).
This gives a 50% chance that at least 1 person in a group of 142 being infected with covid and 1 person in a group of 53 being sick with something (covid, flu, etc) this week.
And a small dive into excess deaths.
tl;dr is that covid is still causing extra deaths but evidence of additional deaths over and above these aren't conclusive.
Firstly, extrapolating the ABS model from their Dec 2023 report. It is based on a cyclical regression model using weekly mortality rates seen between for 2013-2019.
| Year | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | Jan - Jul 2024 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| All deaths | (-3.1%) | 1.6% | 11.7% | 5.1% | 7.9% |
| Without covid | n/a | 0.9% | 5.9% | 2.5% | 5.2% |
A surge in non-covid deaths?
A quick play with a few different baselines shows why this should be taken with a small grain of salt. These are all just very simple population adjusted yearly trends to demo a couple of different baselines.
- 2010 to 2019 (blue) is almost too flat as we have a declining birth rate and an aging population. f(x) = 19x + A.
- 2015 to 2019 (red) takes in an unusually high 2015 and low 2018. This skews the baseline so much that it predicts we'll reach a zero death rate in just 165 years. f(x) = -1000x + A
- 2010 to 2023 (green) skips 2020 and 2022, but appears to have the opposite issue in that the death rate may be too high? f(x) = 447x + A
- 2010 to 2021 (dotted orange) simply skips 2020. f(x) = 175x + A
| Year | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | Jan - Jul 2024 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2010 to 2019 | (-4.2%) | 1.8% | 10.7% | 4.6% | 4.9% |
| 2015 to 2019 | (-2.6%) | 3.9% | 13.1% | 7.8% | 8.6% |
| 2010 to 2023 | (-5.9%) | 0.0% | 8.8% | 2.3% | 2.4% |
| 2010 to 2021 | (-4.8%) | 1.1% | 10.0% | 3.7% | 3.9% |
And without any deaths coded due to covid:
| Year | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | Jan - Jul 2024 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2010 to 2019 | (-4.8%) | 1.2% | 5.8% | 1.9% | 3.0% |
| 2015 to 2019 | (-3.2%) | 3.3% | 8.4% | 5.2% | 6.8% |
| 2010 to 2023 | (-6.5%) | (-0.7%) | 3.8% | (-0.4%) | 0.4% |
| 2010 to 2021 | (-5.4%) | 0.5% | 5.1% | 1.0% | 2.0% |
A slight variation on the last baseline is to include 2023 but to exclude any covid deaths from 2023. This trendline fits in-between the green and dotted lines. With this model, f(x) = 249x + A
| Year | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | Jan - Jul 2024 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| With covid | (-5.1%) | 0.8% | 9.7% | 3.4% | 3.4% |
| Without covid | (-5.7%) | 0.2% | 4.7% | 0.6% | 1.6% |
I'd likely pick one of the latter two, but you could easily argue for almost any of these or other baselines. A couple of notable agencies are:
- UK OHS is using all years between 2018 to 2023 as the baseline
- Actuaries Institute is using the 2023 age-standardised death rates as their base for 2024
- NSW Health is using deaths from 2017-2023 (excluding 2020 and 2022)
05:08 UTC
r/CoronavirusDownunder random monthly discussion thread - November 2024
Look after your physical and mental health
A great way to incorporate exercise into your daily routine is by running! Running can be a fun & flexible way to exercise. When exercising make sure to follow any restrictions in your state or territory & remember to stay #COVIDSafe
Official Links
The state and territory surveillance reports may be released weekly, fortnightly or monthly.
Cumulative COVID-19 case notifications from across the country are updated daily on the National Notifiable Diseases Surveillance System (NNDSS) data visualisation tool. The National Dashboard contains information about COVID-19 vaccinations and treatments, aged care outbreaks, hospitalisations and deaths and are updated monthly.
17:00 UTC
Getting vaccine right before travel
Would there be any point in getting the booster 24 hours before I’m flying overseas (northern hemisphere) for 3 weeks? I’m worried about potential side effects making the flight worse than it needs to be, and if I should just wait til I’m back? I know it’s my fault for not doing it sooner but I can’t go back in time and change that.
08:17 UTC
Excess Deaths for Australia
Here are Excess Deaths for Australia, comparing 2015-2019 against 2020 onwards. Each individual excess death is represented by a single point, spread out across the weeks and years.
https://reddit.com/link/1gd30nf/video/e5q0x1lr68xd1/player
COVID-19 infections are a direct risk factor for many other issues driving mortality, and also have an indirect impact on health system capacity & functioning, and general population health. With the winding down of testing and reporting for COVID-19, Excess Deaths now give the clearest picture of the ongoing impact of the pandemic.
The visual is also available as a vertical scrolling page, which gives a more detailed perspective.
https://mike-honey.github.io/AUS-excess-death-toll.html
Comparing Excess Deaths to the reported COVID deaths from Australia, it's seems there was gap in the early months of 2020, when very few COVID deaths were reported. Of course testing was extremely limited in that period, so this probably shows a truer picture of the impact of the first wave.
Excess Deaths then famously flipped into negative territory under the protection of the quarantine system during most of 2020 and 2021.
Both series accelerated from late 2021 - the "Let It Rip" period. But while reported cases tailed off from mid-2023, Excess Deaths have continued at a similar elevated rate ever since then.
This contradicts the prevailing government and media narrative, accepted by most in the community, that the pandemic is over and life has returned to normal.
Public health leadership surely see the same picture in their data, but in much richer detail.
IMO, it's a stark illustration of the ongoing failure of public health in Australia (as elsewhere) to stand up to the politicians as public servants, and act in the interests of the public in their care.
The data source is the HMD dataset of weekly deaths by Country.
https://www.mortality.org/Data/STMF
On this "context" page, I've added charts to explain the trends and calculations. For Australia since 2020, the excess deaths are +4.7% higher than the expected deaths.
Here's the historical trend of weekly deaths for Australia: 2015 - 2019. The typical pattern was a winter wave and summer lulls.
I derive the weekly growth for 2015-2019 and project the counts for 2020 onwards using the growth (or decline). This is standardised by the Age Groups available in the HMD data, to reflect the demographic mix more accurately. The result is considered "Expected Deaths". It is shown here against the actual deaths reported for 2020 onwards.
I then subtract "Expected Deaths" from the actual/raw deaths, for 2020 onwards, to get "Excess Deaths".
This gives similar results to the analysis of "Excess mortality" presented by OWID:
https://ourworldindata.org/excess-mortality-covid
Of course Excess Deaths could occur for any reason. But the usual variations from the trend are tiny. If you want to point at any other driving cause besides the COVID pandemic, to be credible it will need to:
- Be new in 2020, pause until late 2021 then resume
- Result in historically massive increases
- Be timed perfectly in sync with the known waves and lulls of COVID, for the last 4-5 years.
It's a difficult topic, but one I prefer to face realistically.
On a personal note, I will be imagining several people I knew as dots on the first chart.
I hope this also helps someone out there process their grief.
Audio credit:
Djúpalónssandur beach waves.wav by tim.kahn -- https://freesound.org/s/349133/ -- License: Attribution NonCommercial 4.0
Interactive World covid stats dataviz, code, acknowledgements and more info here:
https://github.com/Mike-Honey/covid-19-world-vaccinations?tab=readme-ov-file
04:24 UTC
SARS-CoV-2 variants for Australia
Here's the latest variant picture for Australia.
DeFLuQE variants continue to grow, but now under a serious challenge from XEC.*, which grew rapidly to around 33%.
FLiRT and FLuQE variants continued to decline, but combined still make up around 30% of samples.
XEC.* variants are showing an accelerating growth advantage of 2.7% per day (19% per week) over the dominant DeFLuQE variants. That predicts a crossover in mid-November.
Data was shared from Tasmania (after a lull of around 3 months).
Victoria continues to be woefully under-represented, the dismal routine. Victoria has shared ~2.5X fewer samples than South Australia in recent months, despite a ~3.5X larger population.
Report link:
22:26 UTC
COVID-19 weekly statistics for Australia
Australian COVID-19 weekly stats update:
The risk estimate is up to 0.6% Currently Infectious, or 1-in-180. That implies an 15% chance that there is someone infectious in a group of 30.
I estimate 22% of the population were infected in the last 6 months, 5.7M people.
All aged care metrics rose in every state this week, probably signalling the end of the trough. The clearest growth trend is from South Australia, with all metrics rising sharply for the last 3-5 weeks.
Report Link:
https://mike-honey.github.io/covid-19-au-vaccinations/output/covid-19-au%20-%20report%20Weekly.pdf
22:24 UTC
Weekly case numbers from around Australia: 3,954 new cases (🔺7%)
- NSW 1,459 new cases (🔻5%)
- VIC 1,062 new cases (🔺23%)
- QLD 853 new cases (🔺17%)
- WA 153 new cases (🔻12%)
- SA 255 new cases (🔺10%)
- TAS 94 new cases (🔺29%)
- ACT 54 new cases (🔻16%)
- NT 24 new cases (🔺41%)
These numbers suggest a national estimate of 79K to 120K new cases this week or 0.3 to 0.5% of the population (1 in 263 people).
This gives a 50% chance that at least 1 person in a group of 182 being infected with covid this week.
Flu tracker tracks cold and flu symptoms (fever plus cough) and is another useful tool for tracking the level of respiratory viruses in the community. This decreased slightly to 1% (🔻0.1%) for the week to Sunday and suggests 260K infections (1 in 100 people). This is on par with the seasonal average.
- NSW: 0.9% (NC)
- VIC: 0.9% (🔻0.1%)
- QLD: 1.1% (🔻0.1%)
- WA: 1.1% (🔻0.6%)
- SA: 1.3% (🔺0.2%)
- TAS: 1.2% (🔺0.1%)
- ACT: 1.2% (🔺0.1%)
- NT: 0.5% (🔺0.2%)
Based on the testing data provided, this suggests around 78K new symptomatic covid cases this week (0.3% or 1 in 332 people).
This gives a 50% chance that at least 1 person in a group of 230 being infected with covid and 1 person in a group of 69 being sick with something (covid, flu, etc) this week.
The growth of XEC seems to have slowed recently, while KP.3.1.1 continues plodding upwards. These account for two-thirds of the current cases and are almost certainly behind the small uptick seen. The more recent QLD variant report also shows this with an increase in KP.3.1.1 sequences (44%) while XEC levels have remained stable (20%).
MV sub-lineages (JN.1.49.1.1.1.1.*/MB.1.1.1.*) are high in Singapore, which is often a bellwether for variants here. This is a FViRT variation from South Asia (rarely seen here) that lacks S31del (deWhatever). While this has a similar relative growth rate advantage as XEC compared to KP.3.1.1, the small number of reported samples and no evidence of an increase in overall non-KP cases in the state reports, suggest this isn't an issue here yet.
As an aside, MC sub-lineages includes all named children of KP.3.1.1, a potpourri of misc minor mutations.
23:08 UTC
COVID-19 weekly statistics for Australia
Australian COVID-19 weekly stats update:
The risk estimate is up slightly to 0.4% Currently Infectious, or 1-in-249. That implies an 11% chance that there is someone infectious in a group of 30.
I estimate 22.2% of the population were infected in the last 6 months, 5.8M people.
There were no major changes in the available hospitalisation or aged care metrics. It seems the DeFLuQE wave was relatively minor.
There are still no updated results for Aged Care from ACT and the NT, which make up around 2% of the national population.
Report Link:
https://mike-honey.github.io/covid-19-au-vaccinations/output/covid-19-au%20-%20report%20Weekly.pdf
00:16 UTC
Paid vaccination for international tourists?
I live in a place where Covid vaccines are basically extinct. My country never moved beyond the ancestral vaccine formula. I found a solution for the past couple of vaccine updates in Singapore, which has private vaccination services with no residency or citizenship requirements. Unfortunately, they're currently stuck on the older XBB vaccines with no updates in sight, so I was wondering whether Australia also offers similar Covid vaccination for international tourists.
It's quite annoying how Covid vaccines are so hard to access even if you're willing to pay their exorbitant retail prices; not to mention the air travel + stay + general tourism costs involved. I appreciate anyone who can help me out with some info.
16:27 UTC
Do we still report positive RAT tests?
Family of 5 and 4 of us tested positive this morning could not test the 5th as we ran out of tests.
Do we still report the positives to the government?
Edit: we are in Victoria.
21:47 UTC
SARS-CoV-2 variants for Australia
Here's the latest variant picture for Australia.
DeFLuQE variants continue to grow, dominating FLiRT and FLuQE variants.
FLiRT and FLuQE variants have been overtaken by XEC.*, growing to around 15%.
XEC.* variants are showing a low growth advantage of 1.7% per day (12% per week) over the dominant DeFLuQE variants. A crossover looks distant, perhaps late November or December.
Data from the mainland states is fairly current right now. But no data has been shared from TAS for around 3 months now. The TAS Health department is still providing variant analysis from their wastewater, so still relying on scientists analysing data using GISAID. But they have stopped sharing their own samples via GISAID.
NSW appear to have halved their previous sequencing volume, unannounced AFAIK.
VIC is under-represented, the dismal routine.
Report link:
01:56 UTC
New Zealand Case Update: 886 new cases, 89 people in hospital, and six deaths
Quick look across the ditch.
Cases are still at fairly low levels with 886 cases for the week to Sunday, slightly up from the low of 728 cases a month ago (19th Sept). These are about the lowest levels for a year, with wastewater readings confirming a low level within the wider community.
The proportion of cases reported is likely to fall in the upcoming months with the NZ government finishing their free RAT program at the start of the month.
As of the end of September, KP.3.1.1 remains the dominant variant, but like Australia, this hasn't caused any major impacts on the numbers.
The new XEC recombinant has been recently detected in clinical samples last week, but it is too soon to tell if it will have any impact on case numbers.
00:44 UTC
Weekly case numbers from around Australia: 3,808 new cases (🔺23%)
- NSW 1,536 new cases (🔺10%)
- VIC 862 new cases (🔺5%)
- QLD 851 new cases (🔺93%)
- WA 173 new cases (🔺12%)
- SA 232 new cases (🔺26%)
- TAS 73 new cases (🔺33%)
- ACT 64 new cases (🔺167%)
- NT 17 new cases (🔻26%)
These numbers suggest a national estimate of 76K to 110K new cases this week or 0.3 to 0.4% of the population (1 in 273 people).
This gives a 50% chance that at least 1 person in a group of 189 being infected with covid this week.
Note that QLD's cases were likely exaggerated with a missed day of reporting last Friday. Using an estimate for that day, the numbers would be something like:
- Australia: 3,683 new cases (🔺14%)
- QLD: 726 new cases (🔺28%)
While cases remain at a very low level, there are clear signs of a small uptick this week, with some of the other indicators including:
- NSW: Small increase in ED presentations and wastewater from Western Sydney with a small increase in PCR positivity rates in the last fortnight (currently ~5%).
- VIC: Positivity rates have been slowly increasing over the last few weeks (currently 6%)
Although states aren't:
- QLD: Hospitalisations are still decreasing, the lowest for a very long time.
- WA: Wastewater readings remain at low levels
Flu tracker tracks cold and flu symptoms (fever plus cough) and is another useful tool for tracking the level of respiratory viruses in the community. This decreased to 1.1% (🔻0.2%) for the week to Sunday and suggests 286K infections (1 in 91 people). This is on par with the seasonal average.
- NSW: 0.9% (🔻0.5%)
- VIC: 1% (🔻0.4%)
- QLD: 1.1% (🔺0.3%)
- WA: 1.7% (🔺0.6%)
- SA: 1.1% (🔺0.3%)
- TAS: 1.2% (🔻1.2%)
- ACT: 1.2% (🔻0.2%)
- NT: 0.3% (🔻1.8%)
Based on the testing data provided, this suggests around 86K new symptomatic covid cases this week (0.3% or 1 in 301 people).
This gives a 50% chance that at least 1 person in a group of 209 being infected with covid and 1 person in a group of 63 being sick with something (covid, flu, etc) this week.
QLD variant report shows KP.3.1.1 (39%) and XEC (19%) starting to dominate the other variants, nearly making up two thirds of the cases. The small national uptick is almost certainly due to the increase of XEC cases while KP.3.1.1 cases appear stable as the others show decreasing frequency in the community.
And on an unrelated note, the high pneumonia presentations that started towards the end of last year are finally starting to fall back towards normal levels. These are almost certainly due to a slow Mycoplasma pneumoniae wave that was causing more hospital presentations in NSW than all of the other respiratory infections combined (mostly children). It's now on the high side of the normal range.
00:18 UTC
Is this test positive
Took a COVID test with my wife , As we both been in close contact This is the test without the lid as the line didn’t get to the T Does this mean it’s positive
21:38 UTC
Question about immunity
I had Covid 2 weeks ago and started testing negative last week. My parents just got home from an international trip and have just tested positive. Am I completely immune or do I need to isolate myself from them? I’m going away Friday so really don’t want to get it again.
02:32 UTC
SARS-CoV-2 variants for Australia
Here's the latest variant picture for Australia.
DeFLuQE variants continue to grow, dominating FLiRT and FLuQE variants.
FLiRT variants have been overtaken by XEC.*, growing to around 13%.
XEC.* variants are showing a slowing growth advantage of 1.6% per day (11% per week) over the dominant DeFLuQE variants. A crossover now looks distant, perhaps late November or December.
Data from the mainland states is fairly current right now. But no data has been shared from TAS for over 2 months now.
VIC is under-represented, the dismal routine.
Report link:
23:29 UTC
Weekly case numbers from around Australia: 3,107 new cases (🔻11%)
- NSW 1,402 new cases (🔻21%)
- VIC 823 new cases (🔺20%)
- QLD 441 new cases (🔻29%)
- WA 155 new cases (🔺12%)
- SA 184 new cases (🔺16%)
- TAS 55 new cases (🔺4%)
- ACT 24 new cases (🔻60%)
- NT 23 new cases (🔺28%)
These numbers suggest a national estimate of 62K to 93K new cases this week or 0.2 to 0.4% of the population (1 in 335 people).
This gives a 50% chance that at least 1 person in a group of 232 being infected with covid this week.
Note: QLD cases from today were delayed. Using guesstimates:
- Australia: 3,232 new cases (🔻8%)
- QLD 566 new cases (🔻9%)
Flu tracker tracks cold and flu symptoms (fever plus cough) and is another useful tool for tracking the level of respiratory viruses in the community. This decreased to 1.3% (🔻0.3%) for the week to Sunday and suggests 338K infections (1 in 77 people). This is on par with the seasonal average.
- NSW: 1.4% (🔻0.3%)
- VIC: 1.5% (🔺0.1%)
- QLD: 0.8% (🔻0.4%)
- WA: 1% (🔻1.1%)
- SA: 0.7% (🔻0.9%)
- TAS: 2.4% (🔺0.7%)
- ACT: 1.4% (🔻0.4%)
- NT: 2.5% (🔺2.2%)
Based on the testing data provided, this suggests around 94K new symptomatic covid cases this week (0.4% or 1 in 275 people).
This gives a 50% chance that at least 1 person in a group of 191 being infected with covid and 1 person in a group of 53 being sick with something (covid, flu, etc) this week.
Queensland COVID genomics epidemiology summary
QLD have just started publishing these reports, and provides an excellent up to date summary of variants
- KP.3.1.1 is the dominant lineage in clinical surveillance samples, with approximately 35% of samples tested assigned this lineage over the past 2 weeks.
- The proportion of XEC continues to increase and is now approximately 14%.
So it appears that KP.3.1.1 and XEC are now fairly widespread, but neither are managing to trigger a new surge yet (touch wood).
03:33 UTC
Vaccinating infants
In Australia, the recommendation is only to vaccinate children if they have certain medical conditions, unlike in the US where the CDC recommends all people over six months of age should be vaccinated.
Just wondering if anyone has any insight as to why Australia does not make it available to all children? Even if covid is not typically as bad in kids, surely there's benefits in getting it?
02:33 UTC