Of course all politicians consider their decisions in the light of probable political outcomes for themselves. But that does not justify putting Politics first before the Pandemic and the wellbeing of the community.
The end game is when we get to the science based vaccination threshold but continue with masking and vaccine passport (Europe is going ahead and only matter of time everywhere else to force the unvaccinated to come to party). So we already know the delays in the vaccine procurement led to our current failures and necessity to resort to lockdowns, plus of course the hesitancy to act fast.
NSW may end up having to live with the virus, because perhaps the horses have bolted too far to bring them home. And if that is the case, be prepared for many hundreds and then many thousands of cases. And with many thousands, there would be more deaths that could have been avoided if it wasn't the failure of the Libs in always balancing health with economy. Get the health right and the economy will be in place. And it would also be less costly, a one week hard lockdown would be far cheaper than a 2 month or protracted half baked lockdown with no end date in sight. Scomo never stood for lockdown from the outset, then agreed to follow the Premiers' lead which were successful (until Gladys) , then say lockdown is the only alternative when Gladys push the blame of vaccines on the Fed, and latest is that he will still want to balance the health vs economy equation. This health vs economy equation sounds rational but if the virus genie is getting out of control and hospitalisation rockets, there will still be no economy to shout about despite no lockdowns. And we have seen countries after countries that initially stood to be free of lockdowns eventually cave in to lockdowns after cases rise due to no or limited restrictions, only to impact their economies far worse than taking the bitter pill at the outset.
Measured, Balance DOES NOT WORK. You either do it RIGHT or join Boris Johnson (in the latter case, brace for many deaths that could have been avoided. Yes, Trump is responsible for many of the 600k avoidable deaths in the US through his politicisation of the pandemic ).
And guess we must always be reminded that Australia would still be more successful than many other countries in the world in regards to the pandemic. If it is any comfort that a smart successful student must be consoled to feel better by comparing him/her to the other 95% or the bottom 20% of poor students after he/she failed to make the grades normally expected , especially because of poor choices made.
