THE death of a third Hunter resident - a 74-year-old woman who had been aboard the fateful Ruby Princess - drives home the reality in this region of a modern plague that has killed almost 115,000 people around the planet.
Ratios vary from country to country, but the present fatality rate is more than 6 per cent, or one in 16 of the 1.85 million people tested as positive for the disease.
Saying that coronavirus is serious only for those who are old or who have pre-existing medical conditions - as some who play down the significance of the situation tend to do - is not only an insult to older people and the less well, it's to ignore the very real role that younger and asymptomatic carriers may play in spreading the virus.
With the frustrations of a heavily restricted Easter holiday behind us, we will return to our new version of "normal" this week, knowing that even if we have "flattened the curve", the virus is still wreaking global havoc.
In parts of China and Japan, second spikes are occurring as overseas travellers return or local restrictions are lifted, giving an early indication of what other nations, including Australia, can expect if existing lock-downs are eased too quickly.
The Morrison government has set Australia's course to a post-coronavirus world on the basis that our economy is likely to be in "hibernation" for at least six months.
Federal Health Minister Greg Hunt said yesterday that an end to restrictions depended on three conditions: a sustained fall in cases, sufficient "rapid response" capabilities to cope with another spike in cases, and an "exit plan" to restart the economy, safely, in stages, as conditions allow.
Mr Hunt says work on the exit plan is under way.
It is important the government give as much detail about this plan, as quickly as possible. Increasing commentary on the supposed differences between the government's approaches to coronavirus and climate change are a sign the political detente that has enabled a bipartisan approach to COVID-19 will only last so long.
The government needs to explain to people that its decisions in the absence of a vaccine will remain a balancing act between the threat, on one hand, and the collateral damage done by the "hibernating" cure, on the other.
But even if our road "through" the virus becomes a road "out", full trade and travel will be impossible until the US and Europe, especially, are out of crisis mode.
ISSUE: 39,579.
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