A ‘NO-WIN SITUATION’
It’s society’s own Sophie’s Choice … health or the economy. Choose the wellbeing of business and watch COVID infections and death rates soar as social distancing disappears; or choose public safety and watch customers disappear and the economy die – dragging people down with it.
While governments around the world have been struggling with this ethical dilemma, it’s about to bite the Gold Coast square on the a--e.
Just days after the announcement of a “bubble” between the Gold Coast and Tweed Shire, Queensland’s Chief Health Officer Dr Jeanette Young has issued a stern warning to border residents to make contingency plans for a dramatic “next step”.
“At the border, this is the really difficult part for Queensland,” Dr Young said.
“I think every single person who lives in any of those border communities in either Queensland or NSW needs to think what will I do, what will my family do if the border closes because there are cases spreading north from Sydney.
“If we had to close the border to everyone in NSW, no exemptions for people in those border zones who work or go to school in Queensland. If we have to close, then what will people do?”
Not to go all Nostradamus here, but I saw this one coming.
I’ll admit that at first I thought the bubble was a fantastic solution, one that provides a real answer to the question of health or economy
– because the bubble gives us both.
It keeps our community safe while also allowing our businesses, especially those on the border, to stay afloat.
Except … does it keep our community safe?
As Dr Young said yesterday, “The border is difficult because people from NSW can travel into those NSW border areas and they can then pass on the infection to people who can then cross the border into Queensland.”
Even beyond this, who is to say that people on the NSW side of the border aren’t themselves travelling south to Byron and beyond before bringing those germs back to the bubble?
Or that people on the Queensland side aren’t visiting the over-the-border bubble and heading back to Brisbane before the 14-day “quarantine” period is over?
The only checkpoint is the actual border between NSW and Queensland, beyond that it’s down to the honesty policy. And I think we’ve all seen how well that works.
So we’re back at the conundrum: a hard close for the border that leaves our businesses, employees, families, friends, students, schools and more stranded? Or don’t pop the bubble and risk the spread of COVID? It’s a no-win situation. Except there is one final solution. Well, one final but temporary solution.
And again, I’m not Robinson Crusoe here … in fact I’m more of a broken record: move the bloody border checkpoint.
For the love of God, our health and the economy, an official border checkpoint south of the Tweed Shire is surely the answer we seek.
Yes, that will mean that NSW bubble residents cannot move within their own state, but they could move within ours, both within the Gold Coast and beyond. It’s a safer option for us and them – in terms of health and the economy.
Of course, Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk has tried to do just that, but her suggestion to NSW counterpart Gladys Berejiklian that the border checkpoint be moved went down like a lead balloon.
“Given the rate of lack of community transmission in northern NSW, we see absolutely no reason whatsoever why it should move south,” Ms Berejiklian said in July.
“We have no intention of changing the existing checkpoint.”
But that was then. NSW is now on edge, poised to plunge over the precipice into widespread community transmission of COVID.
Never mind the safety of Sunshine State residents, if Ms
Berejiklian has any concern for the welfare of NSW’s northern citizens, she’ll see that moving the official border checkpoint south is the only solution to save them physically and financially.
It’s actually the opposite of Sophie’s Choice. For Gladys, the decision should be simple.
Read Ann Wason Moore every Tuesday and Saturday in the Bulletin