Delta and the transition to the new normal
25 October 2021
We spent almost all of the last few months in some kind of lock-down. After the trip to Lord Howe Island was cancelled because of the outbreak in New South Wales, we watched with anxiety as the case numbers rose quickly there. Canada Day passed with things still fairly normal in Melbourne, and I tried marking it by making apple fritters after discovering that they were a “Canadian” thing when ordering other Canadian home-made food from a local business.
July started with a few social events: a friend’s birthday party at a bar, dinner at another friend’s house and then the opening event for the Victorian Pride Centre. Victoria had been COVID free for long enough that travel to Western Australia was possible, so we were cautiously optimistic that the planned vacation for Jay’s 50th birthday would go ahead. We had made a donation to help with the fit-out of the Pride Centre, so we took the opportunity to get a picture with the relevant seating.
The following day there was an incursion of COVID from the outbreak in NSW and we went back into lockdown with the same tight rules as during the long lockdown of 2020. The WA border closed again and I rescheduled the birthday trip for 2022. The local outbreak came under sufficient control that we were able to go to Sorrento for Jay’s birthday.
On the actual day of his 50th, the restaurant I had been hoping to visit was still closed for one more day. He suggested that we go on the new chairlift at Arthur’s Seat, now much safer than the previous version we had last ridden with Jim. My original plan of swimming with whale sharks and dinner overlooking the Indian Ocean having been cancelled, I went ahead on the chairlift with the remaining plan of giving him the necklace I had had made and asking him to marry me. He said yes and I took a bad photo to remember the moment.
We haven’t planned a date for a wedding because of the uncertainty around travel. We returned from the week’s break for his birthday somewhat refreshed and excited to be able to go to the real gym again.
By the end of that week we were back in lockdown as the COVID cases rose again. In both NSW and Victoria (as well as New Zealand), the new and more infectious Delta-variant of COVID proved impossible to eliminate with physical restrictions. We were to remain locked-down until the rate of vaccination was high enough to bring the outbreak under sufficient control.
We were all very familiar with the routine in Melbourne and fell back into the routine of spending time at home, Zoom costume birthday parties, garage workouts and spending the designated hour for outdoor exercise walking or in the park nearby.
Just like last year, it seemed both endless and at the same time blurred into the same day. I turned away from following the daily announcements and cases, but we both continued to watch the vaccination numbers creep slowly and then quickly towards the thresholds for reopening. For something else to worry about, I had the lesion on my lip biopsied. It turned out to be actinic cheilosis (sun damage which is not cancerous).
Modelling had suggested that with vaccination we should see significant decoupling of case numbers from hospital workload and this has indeed been the case. Nonetheless the public hospital has become almost as busy with COVID as it was last year. The plan is to relax the restrictions and reopen business as fast as can be done while the vaccine effect takes over the work of limiting illness and the hospitals remain as heavily-utilised as they can manage. We are likely to have a significant amount of COVID work in the ICU well into 2022, but the rest of life should become substantially normal.
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July started with a few social events: a friend’s birthday party at a bar, dinner at another friend’s house and then the opening event for the Victorian Pride Centre. Victoria had been COVID free for long enough that travel to Western Australia was possible, so we were cautiously optimistic that the planned vacation for Jay’s 50th birthday would go ahead. We had made a donation to help with the fit-out of the Pride Centre, so we took the opportunity to get a picture with the relevant seating.
The following day there was an incursion of COVID from the outbreak in NSW and we went back into lockdown with the same tight rules as during the long lockdown of 2020. The WA border closed again and I rescheduled the birthday trip for 2022. The local outbreak came under sufficient control that we were able to go to Sorrento for Jay’s birthday.
On the actual day of his 50th, the restaurant I had been hoping to visit was still closed for one more day. He suggested that we go on the new chairlift at Arthur’s Seat, now much safer than the previous version we had last ridden with Jim. My original plan of swimming with whale sharks and dinner overlooking the Indian Ocean having been cancelled, I went ahead on the chairlift with the remaining plan of giving him the necklace I had had made and asking him to marry me. He said yes and I took a bad photo to remember the moment.
We haven’t planned a date for a wedding because of the uncertainty around travel. We returned from the week’s break for his birthday somewhat refreshed and excited to be able to go to the real gym again.
By the end of that week we were back in lockdown as the COVID cases rose again. In both NSW and Victoria (as well as New Zealand), the new and more infectious Delta-variant of COVID proved impossible to eliminate with physical restrictions. We were to remain locked-down until the rate of vaccination was high enough to bring the outbreak under sufficient control.
We were all very familiar with the routine in Melbourne and fell back into the routine of spending time at home, Zoom costume birthday parties, garage workouts and spending the designated hour for outdoor exercise walking or in the park nearby.
Just like last year, it seemed both endless and at the same time blurred into the same day. I turned away from following the daily announcements and cases, but we both continued to watch the vaccination numbers creep slowly and then quickly towards the thresholds for reopening. For something else to worry about, I had the lesion on my lip biopsied. It turned out to be actinic cheilosis (sun damage which is not cancerous).
Modelling had suggested that with vaccination we should see significant decoupling of case numbers from hospital workload and this has indeed been the case. Nonetheless the public hospital has become almost as busy with COVID as it was last year. The plan is to relax the restrictions and reopen business as fast as can be done while the vaccine effect takes over the work of limiting illness and the hospitals remain as heavily-utilised as they can manage. We are likely to have a significant amount of COVID work in the ICU well into 2022, but the rest of life should become substantially normal.
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