WHEN National Cabinet met two Fridays ago on December 10 it was supposed to be the final meeting for the year, with the next gathering scheduled for February.
Such has been the rapid surge of Omicron across the nation, as across the globe, that the country's primary COVID decision-making body is meeting again today, three days out from Christmas.
At the same time, public health and medical experts cited with approval by governments across two years of COVID defensive measures continue to raise loud concerns about the decisive shift in Australia's coronavirus response, from the command and control model that curbed freedoms but kept cases relatively at bay, to a more laissez faire response based on "personal responsibility".
We cannot know where we'd be had the previous restrictions remained, but NSW yesterday became the first Australian state to break past 3000 cases in a day, with the Hunter New England Local Health District accounting for 820 of the 3057-case total.
Australian Medical Association national president Omar Khorshid said tightening public health measures was not a "policy failure, and in light of the "wildfire" spread of Omicron, the recent loosening of restrictions was "a recipe for disaster".
Neither Prime Minister Scott Morrison nor NSW Premier Dominic Perrottet appear to have been persuaded of any need for a major change in their "living with the virus" settings.
As the premier continues to emphasise, Omicron has resulted in lower hospitalisation rates than previous waves.
Others note that cases have already begun to fall in South Africa's Gauteng province, where Omicron first came to notice.
That is certainly a promising trend.
The problem, for us, is that the premier's preferred metric of hospitalisations is no more a complete a picture of the pandemic than are raw case numbers.
COVID SNAPSHOT:
- Biden increases COVID tests as Omicron now 73 per cent of US infections
- Markets: 'risk appetite up' despite Omicron uncertainty
- Thailand reinstates quarantine for arrivals
- WHO sounds warning on Omicron spread
Businesses are shutting, either voluntarily out of community concern, or because they cannot get staff.
This time, however, there is no JobKeeper to support the economy because there is no mandated lockdown.
There are no simple answers, but Australia is now, effectively, junking the policies that have made us the envy of many during this pandemic.
The question is, at what cost?
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