For your editors the constant coverage given it on TV1 and TV3 has been a turn-off, literally.

From the BFD — full article

The list of medical professionals and researchers questioning the official line on Covid-19 is growing daily.

On April 6^th Professor Klaus Püschel, head of forensic medicine in Hamburg stated that:

“This virus influences our lives in a completely excessive way [which] is disproportionate to the danger posed by the virus… [likewise] the astronomical economic damage now being caused is not commensurate with the danger posed by the virus. I am convinced that the Corona mortality rate will not even show up as a peak in annual mortality.” He states that in Hamburg for example, “not a single person who was not previously ill had died of the virus: all those we have examined so far had cancer, a chronic lung disease, were heavy smokers or severely obese, suffered from diabetes or had a cardiovascular disease. The virus was the last straw that broke the camel’s back, so to speak. Covid-19 is a fatal disease only in exceptional cases, but in most cases it is a predominantly harmless viral infection.”

pressreader.com/germany/hamburger-morgenpost

Professor John Oxford of Queen Mary University London, one of the world’s leading virologists and influenza specialists, comes to the following conclusion regarding Covid19:

“Personally, I would say the best advice is to spend less time watching TV news which is sensational… I view this Covid outbreak as akin to a bad winter influenza epidemic… we had 8000 deaths this last year in the ‘at risk’ groups viz over 65% people with heart disease etc. I do not feel this current Covid will exceed this number. We are suffering from a media epidemic!”

novuscomms.com/2020/03/31/a-view-from-the-hvivo-open-orphan-orph-laboratory-professor-john-oxford

Getting out in a crazy world

By Isabelle Bennett

Here there seem to be more people than usual out walking dogs at a distance from one another which is frustrating for the dogs. Everyone seems very cheerful and says good morning. Two people got arrested for going on a driving lesson (mother and daughter) but the Police Commissioner threw it out. Another guy got arrested for sitting in a park by himself eating kebabs because the parks have been closed. I think that got tossed too. It’s a crazy world.

Shopping

There are heaps of kids home from school, teaching one another skateboarding in the middle of street. Houses are noisy here because there are lots of people working from home in their front rooms (moi aussi) and having telephone conversations. 

We are all shopping at the supermarket, where you use hand sanitiser in and out. There is still no toilet paper to be had in our supermarket, but there are shelves and shelves full of paper towels! Lots of chocolate items but no pasta!

Education on line

It hasn’t made a lot of difference to me because my university workload is crazy. We had to all go to Zoom for holding classes, and, coincidentally there is a new system (Canvas) for organising the students and course content that no-one knows how to use properly. We all had online classes in Zoom and we still have comprehension problems here. The students can manage Zoom better than us, but they are quite bewildered content-wise. 

It’s all been so stressful for every teacher in Australia and probably the world. But incredibly, we have jobs when there are around 6 million people potentially out of work here. Our premier said this morning that she didn’t think anything would change until there is a vaccine. Goodness knows when that will be. I’m glad I have lots of books to read. My French class is going to be on Zoom next term and thank goodness I’m not the teacher, just one of the troops.

Essentials, hairdressers and shops

We are allowed to go out for exercise, work (if not at home), the doctor and shopping ‘for essentials’. That’s hilarious. No one knows what an essential is. The Prime Minister gave buying jigsaws as an essential because his wife bought some for their daughters to do during the lockdown. 

Hairdressers can still work (one reason is that the hairdresser is a recognised temporary refuge for abused women) and incredibly there is no recorded instance of an infection from the hairdresser ANYWHERE. But my hairdresser and I agreed to let it grow for a few more weeks. Some shops are open (bookshops, takeaways) and some closed (Myer department store and frock shops). 

When you go out, you need to walk purposefully and take a shopping bag, just in case a policeman wants to arrest you.

Church is on Zoom. It works quite well, there are no sermons, just break-out discussion groups, and no hymns.

(Isabelle Bennett was brought up in Wellington and graduated from Victoria University. She is a former journalist and was a speech writer in Canberra for a few years. She currently works part time as a university tutor.)

In a reverse of its normal rapaciousness, the council is looking to help rather than burden people because of the pandemic-forced recession, but whether there will be a zero Rates increase this year as some councillors want, and whether Mr Maxwell will take a pay cut as CEs of other councils have done is yet to be announced. A Media Release is below:

Kāpiti Coast District Councillors have agreed on a range of immediate actions to support local people and businesses in response to Covid-19.

At a special briefing this week the Council agreed to:

·       Remove rates late payment penalties for rest of 2019/20
·       A June 2020 rates payment holiday for those impacted by COVID-19
·       Waive rent payments for three months for major tenants
·       Rapid supplier payments, aiming for seven-day payments
·       90-day credit terms for invoices
·       Refund consent deposits and fees if applicants request to withdraw their application
·       Refund a quarter of fees for food, alcohol and outdoor dining licenses paid in the current financial year
·       Increase weighting for local businesses in procurement processes
·       Allow Community Boards to repurpose unallocated discretionary grants for 2019/20 to COVID-19 response initiatives
·       Flexibility to repurpose remaining social investment grants in 2019/20 as appropriate
·       Extend existing library book loans by six weeks

“We know many people have been directly impacted by the COVID-19 virus and many others will be struggling with the uncertainty at this time,” Mayor Gurunathan says.

“These measures are a first step in what will be a multi-staged approach to social and economic recovery for our district. These are difficult times and we are committed to playing our part to make sure everybody comes out of this situation in the best way possible.”

The Council is also reviewing its 2020/21 budget to find further savings, and will continue to assess the situation as the full impacts of COVID-19 continue to become clear and respond accordingly.

Mayor Gurunathan says local government plays an important role throughout New Zealand communities and economies.

“We’ll continue to work hard to support the community throughout this time and in the coming months and years, while balancing the need to do our job and deliver essential services in a sustainable way.”

Kāpiti Coast District Council chief executive Wayne Maxwell says staff have been working hard to reshape the way the Council works and continue to operate, and connect with businesses and the community.

“We’ve moved at pace to respond to this dynamic situation. Further work is underway to look at how we support the community and district to recover following lifting of the lockdown.  This includes looking at a range of possible actions to support the community and help get the local economy going,” Mr Maxwell says.  “We’ll be meeting with Councillors again next week to continue our discussions about how we support the Kapiti Coast to recover from the impacts of COVID-19.”

Those interested in accessing support will be able to visit the website http://www.kapiticoast.govt.nz/covid19-supportpackage or call 04 296 4700 or 0800 486 486 to register interest. A dedicated e-mail address will be activated shortly.

We wonder that, too.  A chance to compensate for reduced turnover since the Ewy opened in 2017?  From the Radio NZ website:

Foodstuffs is refusing to say why its New World Waikanae store applied for $140,000 in wage subsidies despite appearing busier than ever.

On Tuesday it announced that stores that had applied had withdrawn their applications, and the two that had been paid out would pay the government money back.

But despite Checkpoint‘s repeated requests for interviews, neither Foodstuffs nor its franchisees would explain why its stores had applied in the first place.

As Checkpoint‘s Logan Church and cameraman Dom Thomas found out, it has left the store’s customers angry and confused.

Full story including video

Police will be ramping up their presence in the community and on the roads over the Easter weekend to ensure people are complying with the Government’s Alert Level 4 restrictions. Checkpoints will be in place to check people are abiding by the lockdown regulations. Anyone attempting to travel to their bach or holiday home or to make non-essential visits to people outside their bubble will be educated, warned and “where necessary, arrested.” Churches and other places of worship are expected to remain closed.

Longer term, however, things will be different and in fact internal NZ vacations will be a good way of helping the tourism and hospitality sectors which are the worst hit of all sectors in the economy.

Although the Mainstream TV channels have sensationalised the pandemic to the max, the fact is that in NZ the figures have been and are small — those who want to find out what they are can simply go to this webpage on the Ministry of Health website, which is updated once a day.

The most important figure is how many are in hospital because of the virus and this has fluctuated between 9 and 15 nationally since the lockdown began.  Today it is 12. Only 1, 2 or 3 have been in Intensive Care at any one time.

The data for the number of cases confirmed is broken down by District Health Board (DHB) and today the number today for Capital and Coast — which covers from Island Bay to Peka Peka — is 82.  How many of those are in Kapiti isn’t specified but is unlikely to be more than about 15% of that, perhaps less. Bear in mind this is the cumulative number of cases, and 23% of cases overall are reported as having recovered.

On Tuesday 7 April, Brad Olsen, Senior Economist at Infometrics presented a webinar for people closely involved with the Kapiti economy including council elected members. Topics covered were:

• Global overview
• NZ situation
• Local Dynamics

The one-hour video has now been made available for all, click the embed above (note there is about a minute of waiting at the start).