Covid Delta variant is ‘in the air you breathe’: what you need to know about Sydney outbreak strain

[Northerner]

Infectious diseases experts say a greater focus on airborne transmission is needed to manage the spread of Covid but they have warned against the use of alarming language when describing the Delta variant.

The New South Wales premier, Gladys Berijiklian, has described “scarily fleeting” encounters resulting in Delta spread in Sydney after CCTV revealed two people walking past each other at Bondi Junction Westfield transmitted the virus.

The state’s health minister, Brad Hazzard, described the variant as “a gold medallist when it comes to jumping from one person to another”.
https://www.theguardian.com/austral...ravel-prompts-mass-cancellations-within-hours
Queensland’s chief health officer, Dr Jeannette Young, echoed these statements on Wednesday when she announced the state would shut its borders to people from Sydney hotspots.

Covid Delta variant is ‘in the air you breathe’: what you need to know about Sydney outbreak strain

Delta strain is significantly more infectious but it spreads the same way as the original virus – including by ‘fleeting’ encounters and respiratory aerosols

www.theguardian.com

“At the start of this pandemic, I spoke about 15 minutes of close contact being a concern. Now it looks like it’s five to 10 seconds that’s a concern. The risk is so much higher now than it was only a year ago.”

 

[Eddy Edson]

Every time there's a leak from quarantine here it's the same kind of thing: people getting surprised that brief "fleeting" aerosol exposure can be enough; good TTI meaning that outlier rapid infections are picked up and make the virus look "sneaky"; and so on. Delta evidently is more transmissable but it's not like it's a whole new ball game.

This Sydney leak appears to have been via a driver transporting people to/from quarantine, who wasn't vaxxed and who wasn't properly masked. Maybe the fault of health authorities & govt, maybe the driver, maybe his management. But really zero surprise that the virus will find any gaps in the defence, regardless of the strain.

 

[pm133]

Why is it taking all of these "experts" so long to see what has been in front of their faces for well over a year now?

There was some research about surface transmission a year ago but it's been obvious that maniacally scrubbing every inch of your skin and furiously mopping down surfaces makes no difference because we've seen massive spikes in cases multiple times now despite a year of doing all of those things.

They seem to be constantly behind the curve when it comes ot understanding what is happening.

I notice they're also still clinging to the belief that masks will save everyone I see.
They obviously can't see the same waves of infections despite more than a year of mask wearing that some of the rest of us are seeing, which shows they are useless.
Oh well.
Maybe in another year they'll realise the pointlessness of it all.

 

[mikeyB]

Australia has clearly got the world's most uncoordinated defence against this problem. Each state is imposing rules about who goes where, but nobody is on the streets demanding immunisation. Greater Sidney, as it happens, has a high level of vaccination. But that's what the whole country needs.

So they continue with this organised dance, without noticing the elephant in the room. The Delta variant starting to take a hold on a generally unvaccinated population. @pm133, is right, masks are useless if they are not hospital grade. If your glasses get steamed up wearing one, it is not containing the virus. I've assisted at tons of operations, and my glasses never steamed up.

And at the current rate, it will be sometime in 2025 when folk there stop wearing masks and their government terrifying the population. They might have got around to vaccinating everyone.