Border wars: whether to go hard or soft

In NSW, half of all COVID-19 victims display zero symptoms — there has been one death since May — and there is just one victim in hospital and none in ICU or on ventilation. Summer is not the season to be frightened by a coronavirus and Gladys Berejiklian has clearly caught the mad Dan Andrews disease.

The real benefit of the much-hyped vaccines will be psychosomatic rather than medicinal, akin to a placebo, and international travel is unlikely to reopen before year’s end (when this pandemic drifts away after two years, as is normal).

The virus continues to mutate as expected but, fortunately, has become less virulent and barricades at state borders are unjustified by science. Berejiklian is doing her best to appease Victoria and Queensland but this is a fool’s errand and with the health system showing no signs of struggling the case for draconian restrictions and punitive policing has not been made.

Greg Jones, Kogarah, NSW

There seems to be two approaches to dealing with COVID. There is the “go fast, go hard, go wide, keep it out with a hard border” approach. This works, such as in Western Australia and New Zealand. I might even have included Victoria, which managed to get rid of its second wave with a hard approach, but it failed to enforce a hard border, which has resulted in the virus leaking in from neighbouring NSW.

Then there is the “soft, proportionate response” approach. This doesn’t work, as we saw in Europe, Britain and is now being demonstrated in NSW. I believe our Prime Minister once justified this soft approach as learning to “live with COVID”. Unfortunately, this necessarily entails a little dying, too.

The whole basis of the soft approach is that it would allow the economy to keep going, but the on-off nature of selective spot lockdowns is prolonged and unworkable.

The drastic approach taken by Western Australia had a bad short-term effect on the economy, but West Australians have enjoyed hardly any restrictions for the past five or six months, and this goes for the economy, too. In the medium to longer term, the hard approach is good for the economy and for the people as well.

Imagine if the whole of Australia had taken the hard approach right from the start. The whole country would have been in the situation that WA has been in for the past five or six months. We would be enjoying safe interstate travel and trade. We might even be in a bubble with New Zealand. It is still not too late for the NSW government to demonstrate some intestinal fortitude.

Jan van den Driesen, Kensington, WA

When a person of Francis Galbally’s standing is critical of the Victorian Premier and his official response to COVID-19, people should sit up and listen (“Shambolic response puts Victorians in jeopardy”, 4/1). Daniel Andrews dug our COVID hole and all Victorians pulled us out of it, with the belated actions of the Premier given the credit.

The bottom line is that the Premier handled the situation most ineptly, ignoring the very best of advice and maintaining that only he had the answers. Hubris on steroids, indeed.

Peter D. Surkitt, Sandringham, Vic