Joanna HolmanI hope someone publishes a list of businesses still suing the Victorian government over the lockdowns so we can avoid them. Yes the whole experience sucked badly for everyone involved, businesses included. However, blaming a government who hadn’t had to deal with a major pandemic in almost 100 years and so was improvising a response for not being completely successful at holding back an incredibly contagious disease is pretty ridiculous behaviour. Also kinda petty given it’s been almost 6 years and many businesses got substantial government support at the time
miaLooking back I can certainly point at things about the Victorian lockdowns that with the knowledge of years of hindsight weren’t optimal policy and restriction choices. The lockdowns were a difficult experience I hope we never have to do again. Still, I will forever be grateful for the Victorian government of that era and their willingness to do unprecedented things in confusing times. As someone with multiple chronic health issues that my first (known) exposure to the virus wasn’t until after I was vaccinated thanks to their efforts might have saved my life. That I lost no-one I know to the virus is more precious than anything I missed out on in those years.
AJ Sadauskas@joannaholman I was thinking about this just this morning.
It seems to me like a lot of people still have PTSD from the pandemic. We never, as a society, looked back collectively at the experience. The world rushed to move on and reopen, mostly for the good of capitalism.
There was a lot of great research done about air circulation in buildings. We could and should have mandated better air filtration and circulation in buildings.
Think HVAC systems and designs for vetter sir circulation.
We could have come out of it with new norms about social distancing and not overcrowding public spaces. Or making masks the norm for service workers and people who are sick.
A century ago we improved public hygiene by building sewerage systems. We made the diseases that come from drinking polluted water far less prevalent.
We could have done the same for public hygiene for airborne viruses coming out of the pandemic.
Instead, we got a rise in conspiratorial thinking, and far right populism.
It seems to me like a lot of people still have PTSD from the pandemic. We never, as a society, looked back collectively at the experience. The world rushed to move on and reopen, mostly for the good of capitalism.
There was a lot of great research done about air circulation in buildings. We could and should have mandated better air filtration and circulation in buildings.
Think HVAC systems and designs for vetter sir circulation.
We could have come out of it with new norms about social distancing and not overcrowding public spaces. Or making masks the norm for service workers and people who are sick.
A century ago we improved public hygiene by building sewerage systems. We made the diseases that come from drinking polluted water far less prevalent.
We could have done the same for public hygiene for airborne viruses coming out of the pandemic.
Instead, we got a rise in conspiratorial thinking, and far right populism.
@aj It really is stunning how little we learned and kept doing. Like most places aren’t even keeping up the free hand sanitizer in public places thing!
Cybarbie@aj @joannaholman At least the boiled frog dies, the swing to the far right has been happening for decades not years. It began in Britain at least with 'New Labour' and their 'spin doctors' who normalised barefaced lying to the public (culminating in the ultimate lie that lead the US by the nose down the road to the second Iraq war). Remembering fondly the late 1900s when Pauline Hanson was still regarded by most people in Australia as a bigoted QLD loon...