AS the nation absorbs the details of Monday's $130-billion JobKeeper wage subsidy scheme, coronavirus statistics for the Hunter Region, and the state overall, appear to be heading in the right direction, if only tentatively.
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As NSW chief health officer Dr Kerry Chant points out, new case numbers tend to dip on the weekends, when fewer tests are done, so it will take a while longer for any reduction in new case rates to be considered a trend, rather than a blip.
As well, health officials in Queensland and Victoria are concerned that growing infection rates in some regional centres may be signs of community transmission - the very thing our COVID-19 rules and restrictions are trying to stop.
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Even acknowledging the work and time needed to develop the $319 billion worth of government and Reserve Bank stimulus measures announced to date, there will be criticism that it took until yesterday for Australia's 650-plus private hospitals to be brought into the fight against the coronavirus.
As we are reporting today, Healthe Care - the Chinese-owned operator of more than 30 facilities in Australia including Lingard, Maitland and Toronto private hospitals - emailed staff last week to say a "considerable portion" of the workforce was being stood down, immediately.
Hopefully, Healthe Care will agree to take part in the $1.3-billion plan unveiled yesterday by federal Health Minister Greg Hunt.
This would ensure work for the company's stood-down staff, as its facilities are "integrated" into the public health system, handling some COVID-19 cases as well as the elective surgery being bumped out of our major hospitals in preparation for a coronavirus onslaught.
Globally, Australia is still in the middle of the pack when it comes to slowing the disease.
Most of our cases are still air travellers, cruise ship tourists and those close to them.
Still, the rising case numbers in various regional centres - and a rate of community transmission in Victoria that its chief health officer, Professor Brett Sutton, described yesterday as "significant" - provide further evidence of the need to accept and obey the various "lockdown" protocols.
Our old lives are gone, for the time being.
But slowing the infection trajectory over coming days will help us enormously in navigating this crisis as a nation.
This is one April Fool's Day with little to laugh about.
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