Coronavirus: could the 2020 AFL season be called off?

[Happy Days]

Yeah footy rules. There’s literally nothing else I like going on in an acceptable form at the moment, so I’d be shattered (and way more bored) if the season gets canned.

Also I’m with MJP - this season absolutely counts and whoever wins should be really proud of the achievement.

[ReLoad]

personally i think the AFL should use this season as a chance to really experiment and try some of the more radical things that have been mooted over the years.

There is already a huge asterisk on the season, why not make it a tilde and an ampersand too!

I'm not in the camp that this will be the best team that wins this year, there's way too many non football external variables having an impact; medical staff, types and sizes of grounds that are played on, home bases, living away form home conditions for players etc etc.

[bornadog]

What a great attitude!

I keep hearing about an asterix on the season...I just think, yeah...an asterix to indicate the most incredibly resilient team ever!

You look at premierships way back early 20th century? Does anyone remember any compromised seasons? No, all they remember is the premiership and that is what will happen with this year.

Go Dogs!!, lets do it

[Happy Days]

From Twitter:

“We have guys with pending babies and other challenges or things going on in their life." Cotchin concedes some Richmond players are a chance not to participate in the hub"

"Some Richmond players" hey?

[bornadog]

personally i think the AFL should use this season as a chance to really experiment and try some of the more radical things that have been mooted over the years.

No thanks, the game is being stuffed around so much soon we won't recognise it. No rule changes will ever change the game to what these old hasbeen football commentators want it to be - impossible.

Already we have lost third man up, bouncing the ball around the ground, kick outs after a behind has been scored, 6,6,useless 6, and many other things that go to changing the look of the game. They sound like small things, but it changes the unique nature of our game.

[comrade]

From Twitter:

“We have guys with pending babies and other challenges or things going on in their life." Cotchin concedes some Richmond players are a chance not to participate in the hub"

"Some Richmond players" hey?

By picking the youngest side every week, cunning fox Bevo avoids these type of issues.

Out here playing chess while everyone else plays checkers.

[bornadog]

By picking the youngest side every week, cunning fox Bevo avoids these type of issues.

Out here playing chess while everyone else plays checkers.

Wally won't be happy

[Happy Days]

By picking the youngest side every week, cunning fox Bevo avoids these type of issues.

Out here playing chess while everyone else plays checkers.

Maybe just a more dynamic application of the No Dickhead/Entitled Moron Test?

I understand some anxiousness about being away from your family, but it's not a massive ask considering the remuneration, the stated financial vulnerability of certain other players on his own team, and that a damn third of the competiton has already done it.

Trent has looked out for Trent the entire time, and has tried to shift the narrative into some bullshit concern about his teammates despite zero (0) of them saying anything about not wanting to play. Just take a Zoom call with your kids and shut up.

[comrade]

Wally won't be happy

I reckon he's the type to just get the job done.

[1eyedog]

From Twitter:

“We have guys with pending babies and other challenges or things going on in their life." Cotchin concedes some Richmond players are a chance not to participate in the hub"

"Some Richmond players" hey?

I mean sure, but yeah paid a shatload and won't go interstate for a month. I went to Newcastle for 2 years with a 6 month old becuase I had to and was paid far less than these guys. Anyway.

[Sedat]

If you end up having to play some teams more than once and others not at all, the flag deserves a big fat asterix. That's bollocks.

I'm all in on this season and its quirks. But not having every team play each other once in the regular season is a step too far IMO. There is no reason why the AFEL can't be flexible and agile enough to ensure all 18 teams play each other once in 17 rounds. It can and should be easily achieved, with all states and territories except Victoria currently having the virus well under control. If it means the Vic teams have to locate interstate for a lengthy period of time so be it. And if it means pissing Danger off, that's just an added bonus.

I notice some Richmond players in the media today are reluctant to move to an interstate hub. Lock them in to miss the finals if that's the case - their attitude is all wrong for this season.

[anfo27]

At risk of being severely out of my depth I'll add a few comments.



The media is stuffed in this country (and worldwide), heaps of biased sources and lots of flat out propoganda. On top of that horror sells so everything will be geared around the negatives, the AFL media is a perfect example of this.



The bolded quote in particular is what I want to address.

There are two issues here:
A. "Coronavirus isn't killing people, they are just dying of other stuff and happen to have coronavirus as well"
B. "Coronavirus deaths are being overreported. It's not that big a deal"

On A, this mindset is really not well thought out. Most people that already have an ailment are still alive, and are in a position where they can monitor and maintain their health to the extent that they aren't about to die. They might have some form of cancer, they might have a compromised immune system, they might just not be very healthy. For these people they would all otherwise live for longer, but the added burden of their body having to deal with Coronavirus means that their ability to do that it severely compromised. Coronavirus may not be the only issue these people have, and may even be a minor issue comparatively, but it is very capable of being the straw that breaks the camels back.

So how do we prove this? We compare total deaths in a country from a non coronavirus year to 2020, as this graph shows for Italy, comparing death totals for the previous 5 years.

That's pretty clear to me that something is killing a lot more people in 2020 than in any of the previous years, and i doubt it was just a bunch of people whos time would otherwise have already come. Even if Coronavirus doesn't directly kill people, if it's the thing that pushes someone who already has health issues from alive to dead is it not virtually the same thing?

On B, is the over reporting even happening? Again i cite the same analysis of Italy. This graph shows the excess deaths in 2020 vs 2016 in red, along with the reported COVID deaths in blue. Based on that I think it's fair to say that at least in Italy COVID deaths have probably been mostly under reported, especially when you consider the effect the lockdown would've had on other causes of death like traffic accidents and people overestimating their abilities.

While we are on this we might as well address the other issue that if we fail to contain coronavirus and it does get out of hand as it did in say Italy, then what other repercussions does it have healthwise? The classic example has become that there are only so many ICU beds and that if we fill them all up then other people that need them might die. I guess they don't die of Coronavirus though, so technically they can't be added to the tally.




Now this is the big issue. Clearly keeping the economy as healthy as possible is super important in so many ways, it's negative impact on health could also be catastrophic, like COVID.

How do we fix it? I don't know. But I don't think the "just go back to normal" strategy is the right one. The economy has already taken a huge hit, but if Coronavirus kicks up again, and it will if we disregard it, then our economy is proper stuffed. Sweden is an example of the "ride it out" philosophy, and like everyone else their economy has had its arse kicked.

Our government is clearly trying to walk the line between the "stop coronavirus at all costs" and the "economy ftw" strategies, which basically means we will be in semi lockdown for a while longer. We are in a good position relative to most other countries with our case numbers, which allows us to atleast have a go at this. Community disdain and impatience notwithstanding, it seems to be somewhat working as well as could be hoped, and realistically is the best of an atrocious bunch of strategies available to us. It's like picking between Ryan Gardner, Ed Barlow and James Mulligan. They are all f*cked, so lets choose the one that will probably f*ck us the least (Ed Barlow fwiw).




While it's easy to say this, when people (and there will be a lot of people in this boat) are actually faced with the prospect of their parents/grandparents/themselves sacrificing themselves for an economy that is stuffed anyway I'm not sure we will see much community buy in.




Yeah I agree with you, the whole idea that the vaccine is just upon the horizon is probably not a realistic one, and it's certainly not something we should be rushing into. I don't think that's a realistic solution for the immediate future. Maybe we are angling for this to be the way out, but I think the priority regardless has to be to get it under control here and then assess how we go forward.

I imagine they are refraining from giving vitamin recommendations and the like because that is not the governments role. Vitamins and the like might be hugely beneficial, I don't know, but I can understand the authorities not wanting to send out an official recommendation when they have no strong supporting evidence to back up any recommendations they do make and if anything could lose respect from a public which is already questioning if the government knows what it's doing.


I think it's clear that very few countries were at all prepared for something like this and have been making it up as they go at least early, but we are in a good position relative to the rest of the world it would seem. I personally think our economy is completely stuffed, especially once Job Keeper and the rent deferments stop, but I have no idea what we could have done significantly better thus far. All the options involve losing, mostly in a big way, and each path was very hard to predict how it would actually play out.

I imagine we won't be seeing International travel for a long time, and that we will be alternating between opening up and locking back down for the next few months minimum.

I kind of feel sorry for the government (not really), because they are on a hiding to nothing. Just look at the headlines from dickheads telling them to open everything up whilst also asking how they could be so irresponsible to ease restrictions whenever the case numbers flare up again. This is coupled with a public which has a lot of people twisting the published rules to suit themselves even when it is clearly in contravention of the rules intent.

We will obviously see how this plays out, and I hope it is with the minimum pain for everyone involved, but I'm not sure we are doing too much wrong so far.

Btw if you are interested in reading the report i sourced the graphs from it is available through this link. Like any typical argumentative commenter on Facebook I have no idea as to how reliable this source is, but it passes the glance over test and backs up some things I've read here and there so hopefully it's sufficient.

I have never said let the vulnerable people die. Yes people are dying but the virus strikes fatally, almost entirely, the elderly population that is already afflicted with many life-threatening medical conditions.
You don’t lock down the population. You target the sub-population, the small minority of very vulnerable people, and do everything you can to shield them from this virus until it passes or the normal herd immunity that eventually will make it go away.

Lets look at Sweden then. They didn't lockdown but Sweden is a socialist country so by & large they heeded to the governments advice so it wasn't back to normal for them anyway. Even if you say they didn't lockdown, when you compare their numbers to others that did lockdown their numbers are not worse. So wouldn't that indicate lockdown has nothing to do with it? Japan didn't lockdown either by the way & nobody seems to be mentioning them.

I'm not sure i agree we are in a good position at all. We have little infection rates compared to others so when do we ever open up when we're walking on eggshells all the time? We've set our policy based on infection rates instead of hospital admissions. Yes we've had a growth in infection rates but thats more of a reflection on the amount of testing we're doing. Infection rates mean little, its how many are in hospital. You can have a million new infections but if thats little to no hospital admissions then thats actually a positive not a negative. The way we are doing it is to ensure we have no infections so we have no choice but to wait for the vaccine unicorn to fly into town.

The health implications in the US will be catastrophic. What you have to remember is there are millions of people out of work & with no health care. These people will not have enough money to pay their bills & provide food for their family. Your first line of defence is your immune system & what you put into your mouth plays a huge role in the quality of your immune system.

How can it not be a role of government health officials to recommend health advice? You have the Prime Minister advising the population not hoard buy. As i've said in my previous post there are studies that have shown vitamin D had positive results with influenza & another study that showed positive results with zinc, magnesium & vitamin D. There also good studies showing great results with hydroxychloroquine & vitamin C.

Time will provide the answers but unlike most i don't think we are doing much right.

[anfo27]

"are two issues here:
A. "Coronavirus isn't killing people, they are just dying of other stuff and happen to have coronavirus as well"
B. "Coronavirus deaths are being overreported. It's not that big a deal"

On A, this mindset is really not well thought out. Most people that already have an ailment are still alive, and are in a position where they can monitor and maintain their health to the extent that they aren't about to die. They might have some form of cancer, they might have a compromised immune system, they might just not be very healthy. For these people they would all otherwise live for longer, but the added burden of their body having to deal with Coronavirus means that their ability to do that it severely compromised. Coronavirus may not be the only issue these people have, and may even be a minor issue comparatively, but it is very capable of being the straw that breaks the camels back"

Cannot believe this even needs to be explained.

Some of the commentary here is bordering on tinfoil hat stuff.

If you have a spare 12 minutes then watch this interview. This guy is a US senator as well as a doctor. Important imo to try to get both sides of the story & then make up your mind instead of blocking things out based on preconceived views.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1CZzdSzUZLE

[Twodogs]

I have never said let the vulnerable people die. Yes people are dying but the virus strikes fatally, almost entirely, the elderly population that is already afflicted with many life-threatening medical conditions.
You don’t lock down the population. You target the sub-population, the small minority of very vulnerable people, and do everything you can to shield them from this virus until it passes or the normal herd immunity that eventually will make it go away.

Lets look at Sweden then. They didn't lockdown but Sweden is a socialist country so by & large they heeded to the governments advice so it wasn't back to normal for them anyway. Even if you say they didn't lockdown, when you compare their numbers to others that did lockdown their numbers are not worse. So wouldn't that indicate lockdown has nothing to do with it? Japan didn't lockdown either by the way & nobody seems to be mentioning them.

I'm not sure i agree we are in a good position at all. We have little infection rates compared to others so when do we ever open up when we're walking on eggshells all the time? We've set our policy based on infection rates instead of hospital admissions. Yes we've had a growth in infection rates but thats more of a reflection on the amount of testing we're doing. Infection rates mean little, its how many are in hospital. You can have a million new infections but if thats little to no hospital admissions then thats actually a positive not a negative. The way we are doing it is to ensure we have no infections so we have no choice but to wait for the vaccine unicorn to fly into town.

The health implications in the US will be catastrophic. What you have to remember is there are millions of people out of work & with no health care. These people will not have enough money to pay their bills & provide food for their family. Your first line of defence is your immune system & what you put into your mouth plays a huge role in the quality of your immune system.

How can it not be a role of government health officials to recommend health advice? You have the Prime Minister advising the population not hoard buy. As i've said in my previous post there are studies that have shown vitamin D had positive results with influenza & another study that showed positive results with zinc, magnesium & vitamin D. There also good studies showing great results with hydroxychloroquine & vitamin C.

Time will provide the answers but unlike most i don't think we are doing much right.

Quick question. Do you mean hydroxychloroquine combined with vitaman C? Or tests showing good results with hydroxy and also tests showing good results with vitamin C?

[Twodogs]

I just think someone is going to win the most incredible premiership ever won in the most incredible circumstances imaginable.

Sure - winning a flag after a full pre-season and a pre-set fixture/finals series is admirable. But this? Overcoming interruptions, hastily rescheduled games, modified playing conditions, quite frankly ASTONISHING umpiring, these things called HUBS, key staff including assistant coaches being stood down, weird game times, irregular inter-game breaks, zero crowds, small crowds...I could go on forever.

Win this and THAT is a story to tell.

Yep, agree 100% on that. With all the changes, unpredictability and extra rules to get used to then this will be a premiership win for the ages.