Official government modelling by the Burnet Institute,released on October 17,suggested cases might begin to increase from mid-November due to eased restrictions (the institute declined to provide updated modelling on Thursday) with a very large peak at Christmas that could overwhelm the healthcare system.
So far,cases continue to slowly tick down,falling to a five-day average of 1021. Federal government modelling of Victoria’s “transmission potential” – a model that incorporates restrictions,mobility and vaccination – alsosuggeststhe state’s epidemic is still in the shrinking phase.
Dr Romain Ragonnet,an infectious diseases modeller at Monash University,said while it was never possible to predict the future,“based on what we’ve seen in Sydney,it is likely this surge won’t be as bad as predicted.”
One possible reason for this unexpected performance is that Victoria is in the “sweet spot” of its vaccine rollout.
Due in part to the slowness of the vaccine rollout,a large number of Victorians have onlyrecently received their second doses.
Evidence suggests vaccines are most effective in the first one or two months.
“You have a large proportion of the population fully vaccinated recently. We could consider this a sweet spot. And we know it has always been easier to control COVID during summer than winter,” said Dr Ragonnet.
“I think the timing is right. Getting to 90 per cent of the 12 years and over population fully vaccinated,you can’t expect much more than that.”
However,at some point the advantage of high numbers of recently vaccinated Victorians will eventually turn against the state,as those doses will all wane at a similar time.
“Come early next year,leading up to Easter,before a lot of us have been boosted,that immunity does wane quite profoundly for any infection,” said Professor Blakely.
“The change in settings is appropriate for now,but unfortunately things will likely deteriorate early in the new year at some point – unless we keep up with boosting.”
After another day of protests on the steps of Victoria’s Parliament,Prime Minister Scott Morrison weighed in,condemning threats made against state politicians,but also saying it was time for “governments to step back,and for Australians to take their lives back”.
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“Over the last couple of years,governments have been telling Australians what to do,” he said. “Now,there’s been a need for that as we’ve gone through the pandemic. But the time is now to start rolling all of that back.
“We’re not in favour of mandatory vaccines imposed by the government.”
Liam Mannix’s Examine newsletter explains and analyses science with a rigorous focus on the evidence.Sign up to get it each week.