Melbourne Australia Locking Down Again Over Fewer Cases Than MA Has Ever Seen

Just a quick note that Melbourne, Australia is doing a lockdown due to a pickup of COVID-19 cases.  This led me to take a quick look at some comparisons between MA and Australia.

Before I look at those, there are many differences between Australia and MA that I should acknowledge that account for their ability to control COVID-19 better than MA has.  For one thing, Australia is a much larger with fewer people per square mile.  Australia has about 6.8 times the number of people but 281 times the amount of space.  There's also the fact that Australia is a continent surrounded by water, where MA is surrounded on 3 sides by other states.  

Right now, Australia is seeing just 0.06 cases per day per 100,000 people (and this is an increase from the last few months)... compared to the 1 case per day per 100,000 people that everybody is super-excited about right now in MA.  At their first wave's peak, they reached 1.5 cases per day per 100,000 people and at their second they reached 2.2.  MA, by contrast, never even got down to 2.2 cases per day per 100,000 last year and in fact only just recently achieved getting down to Australia's all-time high.  We had reached 33.4 cases per day per 100,000 for our first wave and got just over 90 in January.

Let's take a look at deaths... (just a reminder, Australia has more than 6 times the populace that MA does)
Data Point                           - Australia      - MA
Last time a death occurred - 28-Oct-2020 - haven't seen a single day without a death yet
Number of deaths               - 9,140            - 17,953
Max 7-day Ave                   - 22                 - 74
***And if we multiple MA's numbers by the population difference to see a more appropriate comparison:
Number of deaths               - 9,140            - 123,408
Max 7-day Ave                   - 22                 - 509

This is just a nice reminder that while you may feel like MA has done a great job at this, we really REALLY haven't.

Stay safe. Stay sane. Stay informed.

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