Hello and welcome to a special episode
of Auspol Explained. Normally I try
and explain the Australian political
system. Normally this channel is not
about current affairs so don't expect
that as a regular thing,
but there is some important information
to share about COVID-19. This video
was filmed March 24th 2020 so not all
the information in it may still be
accurate but I do tell you places to
find more up-to-date and accurate
information. The World Health
Organization declared COVID-19 a
pandemic on March 11th and since then a
lot has happened. International travel
has been restricted in Australia.
Currently all travel has been asked to
be reconsidered anywhere in the world.
Large gatherings have been banned and
that number is getting smaller and
smaller. Lots of places are shutting down
whether their venues or businesses. I'm
going to be addressing a few things in
this video. First off is health
information, the second one is the
Australian Government's response, and
then finally what do we do now both to
keep entertained and make sure our
mental health is okay. First off: how to
get important information about COVID-19.
Visit www.health.gov.au to get the latest information about COVID-19
You've probably heard this a lot but for those
who don't know the symptoms of COVID-19
are fever, flu-like symptoms, such as
coughing or sneezing, difficulty
breathing which can turn into pneumonia,
sore throat, and fatigue. I have read more on
the internet but this is an official
government list of symptoms so that I
know to be accurate. If you have these
symptoms please contact a doctor.
To minimize the risk of infection they
recommend that you call ahead of time
and describe your symptoms to a doctor
so they can assess whether or not it's
safe to be in the room with you. There's
also the National COVID-19 Hotline
1-800 020 080. To avoid the virus
please take precautions. You've probably
heard this next bit a lot but in case
anyone hasn't got a
clear picture of how to avoid spreading
the virus the health.gov.au website
recommends the following:
take good hygiene measures such as: covering your
coughs and sneezes with your elbow or
tissue instead of a hand, dispose of
tissues properly, wash hands often with
soap and water - you may have heard from
various sources that you should do this
for at least 20 seconds. Yes
soap does work. You should clean and
disinfect surfaces especially ones that
are used often like mobiles, keys, wallets.
Practice social distancing where you
stay 1.5 meters away from people
especially if you are sick and avoid
contact with others. There's also the
World Health Organization website www.WHO.int for advice to the public.
As of this video there isn't a vaccine but lots of
people are working on it.
The government also recommends getting a
flu shot when it's available because
contracting both  COVID-19 and the flu
will negatively impact your health.
So why is it important to follow all these
measures even if you are a young healthy
person? Even if you don't think that you
will contract the virus or even be that
poorly affected by it is important to
practice as many safety precautions as
possible to avoid contracting it and
passing it on to somebody else who isn't
as fortunate as you to have such a good
immune system. The more people who
contract it the more people that they
can pass it on to and the more people die.
Unfortunately that is what is going
to happen. To prevent this: social
distancing and isolation.
It's literally where you put distance
between you and other people.
This means staying at home for anything
that isn't completely necessary like
work, if you still have a job, or getting
food from the grocery store and when you
do have to go outside avoid physical
contact. Again, that 1.5 meter rule comes
into effect. It may be difficult but it
is important - especially in the earlier
stages of the pandemic. The quicker we
limit the amount of exposure to other
people the better the entire community is.
Yes this does mean that you shouldn't
invite all your friends around
to your apartment for quarantine parties
or whatever. So please stay inside for as
much as possible for the good of the
community. This is not just like the
regular flu season. I'm not trying to
alarm anyone - we should just be safe.
You may have heard the phrase "flatten the
curve." Here's a picture to demonstrate
that where there's option A where the
curve goes really high up and then
really sharply down or the curve like
is kind of flat and long in the
horizontal way. There's a line to
represent hospital capacity. If we slow
down the rate of infection then at any
given point in time there's less people
who need urgent medical care. Because
hospitals only have so much space and
resources if we overload that capacity
people will die and not just of
coronavirus. And if we flatten the curve it
doesn't peak over that line. So yeah this
is why a lot of things are being
canceled and it's a good thing. Sporting
events have been canceled, I had to
cancel my wedding plans, my honeymoon -
it sucks but this is necessary. Please
listen to the government. Speaking of the
government: what are they doing and how
do you stay up-to-date? Both the state
and federal government are coming up
with more and more ways to mitigate the
disease. The more that we ignore these
instructions the more the virus spreads
and the worse the lockdown will be. Any
information I give you right now
about what those restrictions are will
get outdated very quickly but generally:
gathering's are getting smaller and smaller,
there are restrictions on visiting aged
care facilities, and borders are shutting
down. All non-essential travel is being
urged to be reconsidered or canceled. One
current major restriction is that only
Australian citizens residents and
immediate family members can travel to
to Australia from overseas. All travelers
incoming are required to self isolate
for 14 days at home or in a hotel.
Information about these restrictions
comes straight from the Home Affairs
website or www.homeaffairs.gov.au.
Travel restrictions are subject to change. I
don't know when that'll be
so please visit their website for more
information. Also to learn more about the
various
measures being rolled out by state or
territory you can visit the respective
government websites of your state or
territory. I will put links to all of
them in the description. They do form a
very similar pattern though in that it's
the www dot state or territory abbreviation gov dot au
so for example WA.gov.au, SA.gov.au, NT.gov.au
the exception is the Tasmanian state
government website for some reason they
don't have a link on their front page so
go to DHHS.tas.gov.au for the
Department of Health. You get the idea.
There's also the federal Australian
government website www.Australia.gov.au for the latest news about the
restrictions and response. You can also
use social media to stay up to date.
I recommend following the ABC on Facebook
and Twitter, that way you can receive the
latest information without having to
constantly google the state or federal
websites. There's a lot of unemployment
so both the states and the federal
government have rolled out different
stimulus packages. I don't have time to
go over all the different state stimulus
packages and those are subject to change
but I will go over the gist of the
federal one. They have announced a
hundred and eighty nine billion dollar
economic relief plan this is divided
into its initial seventeen point six
billion dollar package and then a second
economic rescue package of 66 billion
and then more than a hundred billion in
emergency banking measures to prevent
against a credit freeze. Again, you can
learn more about your respective state
or territory stimulus package via their
websites. To summarize there are some key
points to the federal stimulus package.
There is an unprecedented welfare
increase that is currently a fortnightly
$550 coronavirus supplement for the
people on the job seeker payment, youth
allowance, parenting payment, farm
household allowance, and special benefit.
It possibly also applies to more I'm not
entirely sure. This applies for the next
six
months. It may be extended I don't know.
You can apply for this via the my gov
website that's my.gov.au Please be
patient with Centerlink staff. They're
normally understaffed and underfunded at
the best of times and right now there is
a massive sudden influx of
unemployment so they are very stressed
just like you. Please be respectful to
staff in general, especially also retail
workers. There's also a one off seven hundred
and fifty dollar payment to those
already on Social Security, veteran, and
other income support. Around half of the
people that benefit from this are pensioners.
People in financial distress
will also be able to access their super
and take ten thousand dollars from it
from the 2019 to 2020 financial year and
another ten thousand dollars again in
2020 to 2021.
You can apply for this via the my gov website.
that's my.gov.au There's also
wage subsidies of a cash refund for up
to a hundred thousand dollars for small
businesses and not-for-profit charities.
This is paid out automatically by the
Australian Tax Office.
The government estimates that this will
help approximately seven point eight
million people. There's also one point
two billion subsidizing fifty percent of
an apprentice or trainees wage for up to
nine months. Look, this is only some of it
but probably some of this applies to you.
They're also waiving the waiting time
for applying to Centrelink. More
information will be coming from the
government soon. Again, use the resources
for the state and federal government
website to learn more. Also on the issue
of government: Parliament isn't working
as normal. They sat on Monday March 23rd
to pass the stimulus package and then
the Parliament was suspended until
August 11th. The federal budget, which is
also usually in May, has been delayed
until the October 6th. It's impossible to
judge the economic outlook of Australia
right now and so we'll need time to
figure it out. These dates could
potentially change as things unfold. A
lot is up in the air and multiple
politicians have
contracted coronavirus. I know this all
sounds alarming but please don't panic -
especially panic buying. There is plenty
of food and toilet paper it's just an
issue of getting it into stores fast enough.
Also if you see anyone who is hoarding
toilet paper and other essential goods
then selling them off for a profit then
the Australian Federal Police is after
them. It's not okay to profit off a
crisis and create an artificial shortage
of essential goods. We are all in this
together.
An artificial scarcity of essential
goods harms the most vulnerable people
in our society like the homeless, poor
people, and the elderly. You can report
people that you know are hoarding goods
and selling them for a profit to
Crimestoppers on 1800 333 000 or you can use their website www.crimestoppers.com.au
Toilet paper is mostly
manufactured in South Australia so it's
not imported. We're not gonna run out of
it even if like all imports and exports
with other countries just get shut down.
You will be able to get toilet paper.
Also don't panic buy surgical masks - it's
important that we don't have a shortage
of those for doctors. They're also only
helpful for people who have the disease
and want to stop it from spreading to
others. There's little evidence
that it'll help you prevent from getting
sick yourself. Also: during this time
mental health can be strained. It's one
of the biggest challenges not just to
keep ourselves physically healthy but
mentally healthy as well, especially
because this is a heightened time of
stress and anxiety. So please reach out
to your friends and family, talk to each
other, make sure people are okay, give
each other support. You could find
information and resources on how to
maintain your mental health from places
like beyondblue which is
www.beyondblue.org.au
they also have a telephone
support service
1300 22 4636
there's also headspace that has
information on how to
cope, there's a chat online function at
www.headspace.org.au
and if you're in
real dire straits there's Life Line for
suicide prevention, which you can call at
13 11 14 or access
online services at www.lifeline.org.au
I know I told you earlier how to stay up
to date with all the news but consider
maybe just taking a break if you're
feeling overwhelmed. Maybe log off social
media or don't check the news all the time.
I personally feel overwhelmed when
I'm on Twitter for too long because it
is the same problem and complaint over
and over and over again.
So look after yourself.
What do we do now with all our time inside?
Well we find ways to entertain
ourselves this is perhaps the most time
you'll ever have to write a book or
learn a language but if that's not your
thing: free ways to entertain yourself
can include downloading free ePub and
kindle files from Project Gutenberg
which is www.gutenberg.org
and you can then just read tons
free books directly
on your phone. Now's a great time to
listen to some podcasts - please resist
the urge to make one your own.
There are already too many. Personally for podcasts
I recommend anything by the McElroy brothers.
brothers like my brother my brother and
me which has over 500 episodes and
The Adventure Zone which has fantastic story
arcs.
My fiancee has been playing Animal Crossing like...
A LOT. Netflix Party is a
chrome extension that allows you to
watch Netflix simultaneously with other
people. It also has a text chat function
in the same window as the video you're
playing. So that's what I did on my
birthday. I watched Detective Pikachu
with Netflix party. So comment down below
your recommendations for how to look
after your mental health and ways to
entertain yourself while in isolation.
Stay safe everyone.
This won't last forever
and we will get through this.
Thank you so much for watching there is
a patreon uh etc normally I actually do
just videos about the Australian
political system so if you want to learn
more about the
function of government please subscribe
