AFTER months of Groundhog Day by COVID, life in the Hunter is returning, in stages, to our new normality, even if the mask will remain a mandatory fashion item.
In the short term, whatever freedoms we enjoy will still need one eye on the daily COVID updates.
Yesterday's Hunter/New England total of 79 new cases was an improvement but we still accounted for one in five of the 399 new infections detected statewide.
And "detected" is an import qualifier.
COVID IN THE HUNTER AND NSW:
- Aussies first as quarantine ends for vaxxed returners to NSW
- First masked hugs in aged care centres
- Regional health service recommends 'correct times' between jabs
- NSW COVID update: Four deaths, 399 local cases in NSW
- How to add your COVID proof of vaccination to Services NSW app
Yes, case numbers are pleasingly down in Greater Sydney, but so too is the rate of testing.
The state averaged about 85,000 tests a day this week, well down on the 100,000 to 200,000 range of the past two months.
At the same time, there is nothing necessarily wrong with fewer daily tests.
Mass vaccination not only protects the individual, it is the intended key to shifting gears from "coronavirus crisis" to "living with COVID".
This next phase of the reopening roadmap will not be without its speed-humps, however.
Yesterday, we saw the new Premier, Dominic Perrottet, announce an end to quarantine for vaccinated international arrivals, leading Prime Minister Scott Morrison to quickly exclude tourists from the exemption.
At the same time, Mr Perrottet added a fortnight to the ban on Sydney residents travelling to regional NSW.
Such fine-tuning is inevitable if the "roadmap" is to take account of changing conditions, but our politicians wanting a way past lockdowns must not ignore the often more hesitant opinions of their COVID expert advisers.
Earlier this week, Mr Perrottet spoke of health advice as just one policy consideration, a stark contrast to almost two years of politicians justifying their decisions as "based on health advice".
Similarly, Victorian Premier Dan Andrews yesterday reiterated his determination to reopen Victoria despite a second day of more than 2000 cases and expectations of much higher numbers to come.
COVID INTERSTATE AND BEYOND:
-
Victoria to allow fully vaxed NSW visitors
-
ACT relaxing lockdown
-
65 more NZ cases
-
India reopens to fully vaxed tourists
-
Latest global snapshot
In NSW, one of the most tangible signs of the road to "new normal" is the return to classroom schooling.
Although digital technology has allowed education - and office-based work - to continue throughout the pandemic, the socialising benefits of the playground and the classroom cannot be supplied by screens.
If the modelling and the experts are right, the kids will be able to stay at school, and the world will start to turn again with no return to the economically and socially crippling impacts of further lockdowns.
That's the plan, anyway.
ISSUE: 39,696
