Australians worse off this year CRPEEDTLAI N

THE odd thing about this pandemic is that, for us here in Australia, it’s got worse as it’s gone on, not better.

Other countries had sickness and death, up front, but they’ve now largely come to terms with it and they’re getting on with life. But more than 18 months in, we’re more locked up than ever; yet we’ve got more cases than ever.

More than half the country is in lockdown; and the part that’s not locked down is locking out the part that is, lest there be any chance of an outbreak – even though, eventually, everyone is going to have to live with this virus.

This weekend, Melbourne is into week eight of a “short, sharp one-week” lockdown that was supposed to show the incompetents running NSW how to deal with Covid.

Meanwhile, despite the “deadly Delta” variant, NSW is on the cusp of opening up, with the prospect of flying overseas by Christmas. Victorians will be lucky to get inside the local pub by Christmas, let alone London, but that’s the sorry situation we’re in: a country divided into those locked down and desperate for freedom; and those waiting to be locked down, terrified lest the virus make it to their state.

Never mind the national cabinet plan to end all domestic travel restrictions once vaccinations reached 80 per cent, Queensland’s Annastacia Palaszczuk is rewriting the rules yet again.

“If we get a Delta outbreak here,” Palaszczuk said on Friday – any outbreak it seems, no matter what percentage of Queenslanders might be vaccinated – “we’ll be in lockdown and all businesses will be closed.”

So around the country, this is our predicament: in Queensland and in Western Australia, borders have to stay shut or people will be locked down; in Victoria, borders have to stay shut, yet people will remain largely locked down; and it’s only in NSW that borders are clearly going to open and lockdowns end for the double jabbed within about three weeks, and for everyone else once vaccinations hit 80 per cent.

Scott Morrison said that 2020 would be the worst year in most Australians’ lives; but 2021 has actually been worse. Unlike last year’s one big lockdown, for Victorians this year has been constant house arrest, occasionally interrupted by a few days of precarious freedom.

Why are so many of our premiers addicted to lockdowns and in love with border closures when lockdowns no longer work to eliminate the virus and when state border closures are a (probably unconstitutional) affront to our unity as a country?

Even with almost as many new cases in Victoria as in NSW, Premier Daniel Andrews is still only grudgingly letting back home Victorians stranded interstate; and even then, only if they’ve tested negative, are double jabbed, and are prepared for two-weeks quarantine once back.

The comparison between Victoria and NSW demolishes Andrews’ spin that lockdowns can any longer be effective in controlling this virus.