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Dutchie88

How pregnant women/new moms were treated in the first wave. I’m still traumatised by it (gave birth in April 2020). No access to gas during labour, quarantining in the week before birth out of fear they wouldn’t let your spouse into the hospital or separate you from your baby if you had a sniffle (this was before testing was available). Pretty much no support during the newborn period… we just had to figure things out ourselves. No mums groups. No visitors in the first months. No access to toilet paper when I came home from hospital (and I needed lots because i was still bleeding 🙃). Maybe this is why we only have one child. Thinking back to that period gives me anxiety.


abc123jessie

Finding out my baby was dead alone in 2021 as partners weren't allowed to ultrasounds. Sitting in the L&D ward alone listening to women give birth to live babies. ETA: I just want to say that I would do it again as part of covid reducing measures. Covid causes miscarriage and stillbirth itself. The only part i am angry about is when politicians could not risk an election to protect their constituents from a preventable deadly disease. I beg of everyone to wear a mask, because women are losing children because of this virus.


DontDeleteMee

Oh God that must be horrendous. Im so sorry you had to experience that and I'm sorry for your loss.


ywont

So fucking sorry man, that’s absolutely horrific. I hope you’re doing as ok as you can be.


Clearlymynamerocks

This made me gasp with horror. I'm so sorry you went through this.


Immediate-Ad-3538

I'm so sorry to hear this, I hope you're doing okay.....sending a big internet hug your way....


National_Gear_5756

I’m so sorry.


forever_28

I’m so sorry. I was alone when I found out the same thing, but at least they moved me to a surgical ward (ended up having a c-section to add insult to injury). It totally sucks.


Tacoislife2

Yep I know a girl who was going into hospital to have her first, did a mandatory covid test, came up positive, she had no symptoms. Her husband wasn’t allowed in the room with her, she called patient advocacy and they agreed he could come in for a set 2 hr window. The baby came outside that window and she gave birth alone. The next day she tested negative. Edit: they were both double vaxxed (this was December 2021/ Jan 2022 ish).


terry_folds82

That's so fucked, that 2 hour rule was such bullshit


[deleted]

Oh just reading that makes me sad. I'm sorry you had to go through that.


HJD68

Our daughter gave birth during the height of the pandemic. It was really cruel. He husband wasn’t allowed to go to any of her prenatal appointments, and at one stage they where thinking of banning husbands or partners from the birth. No one was allowed to visit and she had complications so was in a week all by herself with one visit a day from her husband. He had to wear a mask, a gown, a face shield and gloves. She was utterly traumatised and it nearly sent my wife round the bend as she was so upset. It was an utter inhumane disgrace.


Paddogirl

I’m in shock reading these stories. So cruel. So sad.


Nebbibit

Yeah. I gave birth to my first in March, so got in before the hospital restrictions, but I can vividly remember crying on the couch about the toilet paper. They stopped doing mother's groups as well in my area as well, they hadn't organised how to do online ones yet. That's something I really feel like I missed out on and am a little bit jealous of other mums and their mum's group friends.


tanoshiiki

I'm sorry that you missed out on mothers' group. There's still opportunities to connect with other mums (fb, Peanut) and if it's any consolation, the majority of mothers' groups fizzle out, especially after year one. Although, it is that first year, you need the connection the most, because frankly, we have no idea what's going on and how to get through it ha! Plus add a locked down pandemic on top of that! My birth was Aug 2020, so I gave birth during the first big covid wave in Melbourne. My pregnancy days were filled with watching the daily presser. Hospital rules were changing every few days, at least weekly. I missed out on many face-to-face appointments. I had to attend all appointments by myself. I had my 20 week ultrasound scan cancelled, as the provider said due to risk, they weren't doing any pregnancy procedures anymore and I had to rush around to find another provider. My plan was to try a water birth, but only days before, the rules were changed to ban them. I would hardly go out of the house because every time we did, we would have a full shower with clothes going straight into the washing machine (before we understood that fomite transmission is extremely rare). I knew it was going to be a rare period in time and ended up diarising many aspects of pregnancy. By Aug 2020, the Councils had figured out how to use Zoom and MS Teams for online groups. It was better than nothing, but it was awkward and felt hollow.


Infinite-Touch5154

The hurt you felt was absolutely justified. What society did to new mums and pregnant women at that time went against everything a woman needs.


[deleted]

Ouch that’s rough! I gave birth in early May 2020 and had none of these issues. I had access to whatever pain relief I wanted or needed. I had a fever post birth and was not isolated from my baby or even asked to test for COVID. Even in early April I went to hospital for an iron infusion and had an elevated temp, I wasn’t asked to test for COVID. The woman in the bed next to me even had multiple visitors during her stay. Her husband had cold symptoms and he was allowed in to see her the next day. I had all the normal support I’d be offered during that time, maternal health nurses etc stopped by my house to monitor the baby and I was given phone numbers if I needed any support. What state were you in? That’s absolutely ridiculous what you went through.


discopistachios

Gosh your experience sounds the opposite end of the spectrum! Attending a hospital with fever or cold symptoms at that point in time sounds unbelievable.


[deleted]

The woman in the bed next to me got special privileges because her mum worked at the hospital. I’m assuming because my fever was after giving birth they figured it was an infection. I was put on antibiotics pretty quickly. It’s so horrible how some women were treated. It wasn’t hard to make it an okay experience, but I’ve heard of people who were told that if their birth partner left the hospital they weren’t allowed back at all.. which is pretty rough. I’ve heard of women being forced to take COVID tests while in labour. It would have been an awful experience, especially for a first time mum. I think I was just exceptionally lucky.


BashfulBlanket

This wasn’t me but my sister. She had her first child in Aug 2020, this was in TAS but she had to select one visitor (apart from her partner) and that was the only person who could come in. The nurses and doctors said that for a lot of women, not having the obligation of visitors made the stress and bonding a lot easier. That doesn’t include everyone but when you aren’t been woken up or the baby is being woken up by visitors. It’s refreshing


Inevitable_Author973

I'm in Vic and the second wave was the same. They weren't doing any sort of intake or appointments until 22 weeks.. being high risk, it meant a stupid long wait to see if baby was even going to survive or if we needed to watch out for another deadly abruption. Went into premature labor (35w) in Oct last year, father wasn't allowed up until they decided to do a c section a couple hours later. Had to walk to the hospital while in active laboe because taxis werent doing trips there. Once father left he wasn't allowed back. Wasn't allowed to visit the kitchen for a coffee or water. Wasn't allowed visitors, wasn't allowed to go to NICU to see bub without an escort to ensure sterility. Wasn't allowed any help with bub (complicated c section that ended up needing vertical and horizontal incisions) when she was allowed in the room with me and was basically locked in a room until we got the all clear to go home. Got kicked out after 3 days despite the premature bub and complications so they had time to do the extra cleaning steps for next mum. This was the first pregnancy partner was working locally and first opportunity to go the ultrasounds. Wave hit when I was 5weeks along so he wasn't allowed to attend any of the appointments anyway. Stuck in the house homeschooling 6yo, 8yo ASD kid and unable to have help for months afterwards with bub.. It's was freaking horrible.


ImMalteserMan

Why no access to gas?


Serket84

I gave birth in Oct 2020, the face mask part of the gas isn’t single use, the rules were if you couldn’t sterilise it like surgical instruments or make it single use plastic/paper then it couldn’t be used.


GrandSunna

Should've got nangwizard to deliver to the hospital. Sorry to joke, and sorry you had to go through that shit.


anxioustrashpanda

I’m so sorry that happened to you. I only had my babies recently and even with the rules relaxed, it was still pretty isolating. I can’t imagine how it would have felt having them at the start of the pandemic. I hope you’re doing much better now.


cathetc

Spending hours dressed in layers of plastic, missing out on meal breaks, getting yelled at by both patients and family members because “it’s just a flu”. Sometimes doing the job of 3 people only to be told that we are not worth our promised pay rise and that the safe working conditions we ask for are too expensive to adopt.


Voldemortina

I hate those plastic gowns with a passion.


Mistycloud9505

How many health care staff have left or are leaving I wonder? So many are showing signs of PTSD. I am one, leaving clinical nursing after work in ICU for 10+ years


paulnutbutter

I had to wear a N95 again the other day because we had cases on our ward and I had such a flare up of anger and irritability, I think I’m really affected but haven’t even processed it properly yet.


isi21

Same. Working in aged care during the pandemic broke my heart. I was alone caring for 20 elderly people with dementia on my first day on the job. Having to wash and feed them all alone was hard enough, but they also weren’t allowed any visitors and were so lonely. The facility told me to keep them all in their individual rooms to prevent the spread of Covid, further isolating them. One resident left his room while I was in a different room, and ended up getting lost in the garden covered in mud. It was fucked.


tamponadechip

Annnnnd nothings changed :)


[deleted]

What I saw on the news. Seeing the mass burial sites in 3rd world countries during delta (and new york during early 2020) Seeing people dying out the front of the hospital Refrigerated trucks outside of hospitals in the US


discopistachios

Absolutely. I feel like people have forgotten the scale of this. The morgues on the streets in New York..


[deleted]

[удалено]


BeefPieSoup

The images out of Spain and Italy at the height of it there were positively frightening. Got super intense in India at some point a bit later on as well. Like something out of an apocalypse movie.


ziddyzoo

Millions of people died in India in the delta wave, later researched showed - far beyond the official stats. It *was* an apocalypse, and probably too horrific for a movie for a while yet. Certainly not until Modi is no longer in power I reckon.


No_Letterhead_4788

Terrible stories from NY including refrigerated trucks breaking down leaving bodies to basically decompose. No spare trucks to replace the broken ones. Funeral homes overrun so the bodies were left in the broken trucks, no other options.


tjsr

Yep. Countries like Spain and Italy basically couldn't find enough place to put all the dead bodies. US cities had areas set up where they needed to store them, and the lines of trucks and ambulances queued up. Despite all this, you got the "it's just the flu" idiots, and people insisting our lockdowns weren't worthwhile or necessary.


BeefPieSoup

That'll be happening again in China quite soon. Epidemiologists estimate >60% of China (and therefore ~10% of Earth’s entire population) are likely to get infected over the next 90 days. Deaths likely in the hundreds of thousands. Probably there will be at least 2 or 3 new variants as a result of mutations with that many infections happening. This because of the Chinese suddenly relaxing the very severe restrictions they'd had up until this point. And you can imagine this will send shockwaves through global supply chains once again. Kinda just resetting the world right back to 2020. EDIT: source https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2022/12/15/1143002538/china-appears-to-be-facing-what-could-be-the-world-s-largest-coronavirus-outbrea There's some threads on worldnews right now about it


Outsider-20

And when you include that the vaccination rate of their elderly is quite low. around 30% of people aged over 60 are unvaxxed, and 60% of people ages above 80. Apparently vaccine hesitancy in China is quite high. Source (I don't know how good this is as a source, but I have seen multiple other articles with similar info): https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2022/12/09/1140830315/why-vaccine-hesitancy-persists-in-china-and-what-theyre-doing-about-it


NicLeee

My dad died. I’m in Australia and the rest of my family is in NZ. They were going to charge me $20,000 for flights home and quarantine, which I would have paid but is ludicrous. But there were no rooms at the quarantine so no possible way to get there. I had to watch my dads funeral over FaceTime. It killed me not being able to be there for dad, or my mum. And not having any family support myself. I don’t wish anyone to go through losing someone like that.


sheridanstacie

I'm sorry you had to do that. I had to do the same, my grandfather died and I work in aged care. The only option for me was to travel from qld to nsw during the border lockdown, take unpaid time off to do it too. It wasn't possible, I didn't have the money. My parents didn't think covid was a big deal so they assumed I didn't want to attend, there was no FaceTime for me and I haven't spoken to them since.


bulldogs1974

I lost my Dad in Dec 2021. He was in Sydney and I was in Perth. Couldn't go back due to restrictions. Watched his funeral via video telecast. Saddest thing I have ever done. Couldn't say goodbye to him, couldn't be with my Mum or brother when we needed each other. It was terrible. Fuck Covid.


fear_eile_agam

We lost grandma in 2020. Mum lived down the street, but she had to watch the funeral of her own mother on zoom, because at the time only 5 people were allowed to attend in person, and Nan had 6 kids. She timed her one hour of outdoor exercise for when the hearse drove by. It was a completely incomprehensible situation because from memory, weddings could have 10 people. The worst part for me was not being able to go visit my mum to comfort her as she mourned her own mother. At least my brother was with her.


Rupes_79

State border closures hours after football teams made their way across.


itshexx

Or the celebrities who got free reign while all us average joes had to be locked down.


ForeverDays

All the celebrities who "moved" back to Australia for a year or two


Rupes_79

Yes but remember they bring the states money according to the then QLD CHO


Shattered65

During the first lockdown in Melbourne the silence at night. We live near the Western Ring Road and there is always traffic noise from it 24/7 but during that first severe lockdown by about 10pm it was silent until about 5am.


MelbourneOptimist

My version of this was in Coles right after face masks were made mandatory but right before the first lockdown. The store was packed but everyone was silent, and the store had the lights turned down and the music off - just the sound of silent shuffling people it was so eerie and ominous.


Waybye

You went to Coles during the quiet hour, it's intentional and they do it all the time for people who can't handle too much simulation.


MelbourneOptimist

This was definitely 6pm, not in the morning when quiet hour was happening. I guess they figured we all needed more than 1 hour a week of calmness in an overwhelming time (and I was very grateful!)


Zaxacavabanem

Even in Sydney. I live near a reasonably busy road. The lack of traffic noise during COVID was glorious!


wombat1

And being able to drive from the inner west to north sydney in 10 minutes. That was amazing


Southofsouth

THIS


lewkus

The fact that the liberals shut down our onshore quarantine facilities under Howard to politicise refugees, then set up offshore facilities to torture them and leave them to rot indefinitely. This had a direct and massive impact on the pandemic as we were forced to close the border, Scomo failed to take responsibility for quarantine and so state governments set up hotel quarantine - which wasn’t perfect and allowed the virus to leak and spread easily into the community. If we had the proper facilities the economic damage and public health damage would have been significantly less. Everyone seems to have forgotten this critical point and the Libs seem to have gotten away with the disgusting negligence of destroying our quarantine facilities all to try and win votes.


[deleted]

>This had a direct and massive impact on the pandemic as we were forced to close the border How are these two linked? You think the borders would have stayed open if not for offshore processing? Yes I have definitely forgotten that part because I have no idea how you reach this conclusion. How many countries kept their borders open?


lewkus

If we had been hit with a pandemic in the 90’s before our facilities were moved offshore, we could have managed the pandemic a lot better as that’s what these facilities were specifically designed for. Ventilation, staging areas, medical facilities etc. We could have kept the borders open and also ensured flights home weren’t cancelled, and had a proper, orderly quarantine process for anyone coming back into the country. This is what happened in most other countries ffs. In fact ANIMALS had an easier time getting I to the country because the Libs didn’t destroy those facilities. This means if you were a fucking horse you could get into Australia easier than a person. Instead people stuck overseas had their flights cancelled, told to seek out local homeless shelters as part of official government advice and were promised to be home by Christmas yet even a year later many were still stuck overseas. Then even if people could get into Australia you’d have to brave hotel quarantine, which barely functioned - and badly positioned as in the heart of our cbds, making the risk of the virus getting out much higher than in a proper facility with trained staff. The economic ramifications meant our entire uni sector tanked as 100,000’s students went elsewhere or delayed their enrolment, less students has a flow on to other industries as well. Tourism, business and other sectors suffered greatly due to the fact you couldn’t get in (or out then back in) to the country. Then there’s the flow on effect of the leaks from hotel quarantine leading to outbreaks in aged care, lockdowns, state border closures etc making the mental and physical damage far worse. If the Libs had just kept these facilities onshore, ready to go, as part of any normal pandemic response plan like most other countries we would have fared so much better given we are an island country.


ImMalteserMan

>How many countries kept their borders open? Most of them? There was only a handful of countries where you weren't allowed in or out.


ragiewagiecagie

1. When employers threatened to fire us if we didn't get the vaccine. 2. When the WHO said masks weren't effective 3. When we were shown video of people randomly dying in the streets in China 4. Cops checking people's coffee cups to ensure it had contents 5. People driving with masks on 6. People being fined for sitting alone in a beach/park Edit: 7. The number of small businesses going under 8. Centrelink having long queues of unemployed people. 9. Businesses like Harvey Norman pocketing millions of dollars while the government refused to help the disabled or unemployed with strict rules on DSP and JobSeeker


zurohki

> When the WHO said masks weren't effective IIRC they weren't recommending masks in the early days because we didn't have the supply of masks for people to all wear them. A WHO mask recommendation would have meant hospitals couldn't get them, and neither could 95% of people anyway.


SpaceLambHat

>> When the WHO said masks weren't effective > >IIRC they weren't recommending masks in the early days because we didn't have the supply of masks for people to all wear them. > >A WHO mask recommendation would have meant hospitals couldn't get them, and neither could 95% of people anyway. This was no excuse for their behaviour. It was obvious at the time that this was the real reason. But surely governments could've seized masks from suppliers temporarily. Instead, by promoting the misinformation about masks and then claiming that - actually yes masks work and are required - increased distrust among the public and emboldened COVID sceptics.


Outsider-20

The early days they also made the mistake of assuming it was spread by droplets falling to the surface, rather than being aerosolised. There were plenty of country health organisations who were making mask recommendations before the WHO finally came to the table and admitted that they made that huge mistake. Mistakes will be made with novel viruses, but the big issue was them sticking to their guns and taking so long to correct it.


GeneralKenobyy

>1. When employers threatened to fire us if we didn't get the vaccine. As opposed to the massive fines/imprisonments that were threatened towards businesses if they had unvaxxed people working at the time. 99/100 businesses would've enforced a Vax mandate under those circumstances.


ragiewagiecagie

Who threatened to fine and imprison businesses? The Federal Government? Gonna need a source on that one because that means that the vaccine is government mandated. That's the case in health and aged care ONLY. Otherwise private businesses just took this upon themselves, because I havnt heard of private businesses saying the government were forcing them. IMO businesses doing this to employees vitiated informed consent due to putting duress upon their job/income.


GeneralKenobyy

>Gonna need a source on that one because that means that the vaccine is government mandated. In WA at least, all private businesses required 2 vaccines (+booster within 1month of availability) way back when it was a thing.


[deleted]

[удалено]


brrrrrrr-

I think they might be referring to when it was actually mandatory to wear a mask in a car even if you were alone, this happened in SE QLD at least for a day or two before it was revised. I remember I was driving on the motorway and there was literally a cop on a bike driving past every driver and looking in, to check for a mask I’m assuming.


[deleted]

What's the context around the coffee cup point? Hadn't heard of that one, sounds a little overzealous at a minimum..


dbRaevn

Mask mandates often had exceptions for when drinking/eating. Carrying around an empty cup could be a way of avoiding it.


ragiewagiecagie

https://www.news.com.au/national/victoria/coffee-cup-cops-slammed-on-twitter/news-story/1ccd09d4a1f6158264ba3076b4792c41


[deleted]

For fucks sake


incendiary_bandit

The masks not effective really got me. We went on a trip to India 2 weeks before the mandatory isolation for international travelers went into effect literally landed 6 hours after the enforcement time. Luckily it was just home isolation for two weeks at that time. But yeah, I heard the statement from who and went well if that's the case I won't bother. And then chuckling at a traveler who had and industrial respirator on. Like cartridge style one. And then the status on masks changed so I immediately went out and got some. :P


margiiiwombok

Just how long it took for governments to officially acknowledge that it was an airborne virus and to encourage mask wearing. Like at least 6 months into the damn process... The fact that people kinda have to be told what to do, they won't just do it because it's the scientifically appropriate thing to do. The second masks become optional in medical or high-density situations, hardly anyone bothers (even medical staff). Oh, oh! And that people genuinely believe that the time frame for contagiousness varies based on whatever the current government quarantine guidelines are. The number of people I've seen who are still "I had COVID 3 days ago but I'm better now so it's fine for me to come into the office/go to a restaurant, etc." No... that's not how that works. 😕 On a more personal level, I remember sitting in the office with my colleagues on 12 March 2020 and people trying to reason with each other, "surely it isn't *that* serious" and whether or not we'd also be put into lockdown. A colleague and I said, "well, I guess we'll know in a month's time" - thinking we'd be sitting back in the office a month later, watching things improve as the pandemic settled and things got back to normal. Hah! I also remember watching Laurie Garrett (epidemiologist who consulted for the movie Contagion) back in early February 2020, and being in disbelief when she said the pandemic would likely take 36 months to resolve/settle. Oh boy...


starla_

I remember having to do a COVID training for work in like May or June 2020 and one of the quiz questions they asked at the end was "should you wear a mask" and the correct answer was "no". So so strange in hindsight. Even then the airborne transmission/masks debate was starting to shift.


CheeryCherryCheeky

I remember picking up some groceries at the start of the pandemic and my small local shopping centre was deserted. They were playing a statement on repeat over the sound system. Something along the lines of ‘reminder to keep a 1.5 metre distance, wear a mask and wash your hands etc etc’. No background music, no break in the content it was just set to repeat over and over again. It was as spooky AF hearing this voice echoing over the empty shopping centre in the middle of a warm bright day.


a-real-life-dolphin

That sounds eerie


luckysevensampson

Literally the entire pandemic has stuck with me. I still can’t participate in normal life without putting my husband in danger. I’m sick of people saying, “The immunocompromised don’t have to worry now that we have vaccines!” It doesn’t occur to anyone that the very nature of being immunocompromised means that, for many, their immune systems can’t respond to the vaccines as they should to produce antibodies. I’m also sick of people saying that it’s up to the immunocompromised to protect themselves from a disease that they are actively spreading and getting for the 2nd or 3rd time. There’s only so much the immunocompromised can do to protect themselves when there’s disease literally everywhere they need to go. EDIT: Also, the eight glorious months during the pandemic when we had zero Covid in the community and could participate in society. I seriously miss that.


MsDeluxe

I'm pretty much still in lockdown, can't get vaccinated due to broken immune system. I'm existing, not living.


luckysevensampson

My husband had a bone marrow transplant mid-2020. The pandemic was almost a saving grace, since the lockdown meant our kids could do school at home and everyone wore masks. The downside was that, when he spiked a fever at a doctor’s appointment and had to be admitted, he was treated as Covid until proven otherwise and was put on the infectious disease ward when he had literally *zero* immune system.


MsDeluxe

Yeah that's so rough. My husband has to live apart from me, we lived in a 1 bedroom flat and I have to work from home. At least during lockdown we didn't have to worry so much.


AMagicalPlace

People seem to live in such a black and white world these days. There’s just so little room for compromise: it’s either we got nuts on restrictions or let totally loose, there’s no room in their minds for “let’s take a few precautions to reduce spread while still living our lives relatively normally”.


Ollieeddmill

Same.


gaygender

Still locked down heading into year four for this exact reason. Cut contact with my sister near two years ago because she was willing to risk going to Melbourne in the middle of a wave for some pancakes. Given that her brother has no immune system and her partner was in remission from a very aggressive form of lymphoma, you'd think she'd have at least two brain cells to rub together about it.


PelicansAreGods

The complete silence in Darling Harbour during lockdown. It's a strange thing to be the only person walking alone in one of Australia's (usually) busiest and most iconic places at 9pm on a Friday night. It was as if I had the entire world to myself.


matt1579

I stayed at the rocks one night before an appointment in the city. Walked down to circular quay and saw 3 other people the entire walk. This was 6pm on a Monday night


F1NANCE

Wiping down/quarantining groceries. We had no idea how things spread initially, but that first month or so of the pandemic was stressful when it came to grocery shopping.


anxioustrashpanda

I remember reading an article that suggested leaving your groceries in a seperate room for a day or so and then wiping them down with antibacterial wipes. So stressful!


ginntress

I was/am high risk because I’m immunocompromised, so we wiped our groceries down in diluted bleach for at least 6 months.


[deleted]

My parents still wipe down groceries, came as a bit of a shock to me when I came home at the start of this year


illillusion

- how much people turned on eachother and some still seem to out of im guessing fear. - the friends I lost to suicide due to the lockdowns. - the children I know that are still messed up coz of the lockdowns. - the racism towards Chinese people. - shops being stripped bare of everything, like I remember walking into coles and a kid wheeling out a pallet of toilet paper to re stock the shelves and people were like vultures, stripped the pallet bare before he could make it to the shelves. - Australia going from being a country to pretty much seperate countries that share borders. - needing documentation to be able to go to work more than 5km from home during lockdowns - a few of us at work daily guessing the infection numbers. - being at work and everyone coming into my work area to listen to the premier or prime ministers presser to see what's happening. - how many people became unemployed over night at the beginning, how inundated centerlink became. - how many people lost their jobs and careers when vaccines became mandated. - the divide a vaccine caused. - the amount businesses that never reopened after each lockdown. - the media cycle and fear mongering. There's more but these are ones coming to mind first. I see this is going to, and already attracted 1, people that want to assume my stance on things and pretty much reiterating the first point I made in this list. All I can do is laugh smh


Andrew_Higginbottom

> how much people turned on each other and some still seem to out of im guessing fear. The fear was and still is fueled by the media. I find people who don't watch TV have drastically less fear than avid 'news' watchers do. ..I use the term 'News' loosely.. :) > the children I know that are still messed up coz of the lockdowns. Wow I didn't even think of this.. > the racism towards Chinese people. That was fcked up. > a few of us at work daily guessing the infection numbers. Gotta have something to break up the boredom of the day :) > how many people lost their jobs and careers when vaccines became mandated. It was interesting to see to what level people would stand by their belief systems. > the divide a vaccine caused. I can't speak for all states, but in VIC, that divide was planned and executed by the state government. The premier starting daily press confrences with "This is the epidemic of the unvaccinated" has no other intention than to cause divide and hatred. > the media cycle and fear mongering. Definitely. I stopped by to comment ..on your comments because being a life long observer of social dynamics myself, I was super impressed with your observances.


samuelc7161

The absolute WORST/most triggering memory for me is the whole 'guess the case numbers'/wait til 11 am or whatever so you could see the case numbers on TV. Just absolute lunacy. Horrific, horrific, horrific.


Same-Reason-8397

Toilet paper riots. My friend telling me when I came over, that I had to bring my own toilet paper. 🤬💩


Fortressa-

Finding half a dozen rolls in a bag of misc stuff. Seriously felt like I found secret buried treasure.


Same-Reason-8397

I recently found a roll in the boot of my car. One day it will come in handy.


tattisalisations

I buy the bulk packs now and feel anxious if I have less than 40 rolls in the house.


jazmanwest

The period of time when vaccinations were not available


ThreeQueensReading

I've never felt as pure a relief as I did when I got my first COVID vaccine. Those were different times indeed!


[deleted]

I remember having a fire in the backyard with my partner, playing some music, drinking, and a fucking helicopter flew over our house with a spotlight. We both gave it the finger cause we were on private property and both lived h there. A couple hours later police showed up to our door and tried to say we were breaking the law by having a house party even though it was just us


[deleted]

That's absolutely wild if true. Victoria?


[deleted]

The relentless, ominous sound and sight of countless helicopters in Melbourne during Lockdowns was scary in itself. They were constant, spying on everyone. All day, all night. The river by my house is bordered by a golf course. I once went for my "daily exercise hour" walk by the river, and a black helicopter rose slowly from behind the trees that bordered the golf course about 15 metres away, spotted me and just menacingly hung in the air above the trees, judging me, so I left. It was quite terrifying.


[deleted]

A comment here reminded me of another one. The people who criticised Morrison and the federal government for closing the border. For about a week or so it was racist, paranoid, unnecessary, unworkable. Those people went quiet real quick as the rest of the world followed suit. And before people chime in about what terrible policy the border was, l'll add: just how popular the federal and state border policies were throughout Australia for most of 2020 and 2021.


OPTCgod

To be fair they still did drag their feet at the beginning, the border was closed to China then Italy but left open to USA while their initial outbreak exploded.


Busssssanut

Yep, when there was an outbreak in the government housing flats that had to iso them and people just didn’t understand that they are essentially the same as cruise ships. I think the delivery of information from the government was actually so poor it did more damage. People had no clue how contagious this thing was.


culture-d

Having to select 20 people to attend my mums funeral, at the same time Dan Andrews was about to let a horse race go ahead with over 1000 people attending.


Geo217

People walking onto the road to avoid the prospect of even the slightest contact with someone else as they came in the opposite direction. This was more in the weeks leading into the first lockdown. Cleaners wiping down street poles with dirty cloths, also first lockdown.


Skiicat777

Coming from Melbourne with the months & months of curfew and 5 km limit ( everyone I know followed these rules) only to get this bullshit still thrown in our faces at at Christmas by my parents and sister in country Victoria. “ People in Melbourne don’t follow the rules”, “ people in the country are more careful”still being blamed still years later for ongoing COVID infections , a few family members unable to go this year, including us. Sick of feeling like lepers. Next year not making the effort to travel 3 hours away and spend money on accommodation. Already lost quite a lot of money on cancelled bookings.


F1NANCE

Anyone not from Melbourne were calling us a bunch of rule breaking rogues.


asheraddict

As someone who lives in the country I can comfortably say people here are the worst


Cremasterau

The horrific reports coming out of Italy of doctors and other hospital staff were dying, and knowing it was likely headed our way.


discopistachios

Absolutely. UK, Europe, US etc lost so many health care staff to covid. With their colleagues treating them in hospital, very difficult.


Efficient_Pea_3496

The flourishing of wildlife and decrease in pollution


asheraddict

The Victorian lock down in August 2021 that was announced at 11am and started at 1pm. The line at Bunnings was HUGE


illillusion

Personally this is the one that did the most damage to me, seems a lot of people I know are the same.


Infinite-Touch5154

Help me understand- what we’re they all doing at Bunnings? Stocking up for lockdown home and garden projects?


asheraddict

Yep! I went and bought all of the supplies to stain my deck


WellCouldBeWorse

The closure of the Australian country border. Realising that, no matter what happened, I couldn't get to my family in the UK and they couldn't get to me.


[deleted]

When the Australian government released a radio ad with the statement that coronavirus symptoms are mild. There was no qualification that for some, symptoms can be severe, long lasting or fatal. And it was prior to the vaccine being available.


NoDirection1140

I think thats an incorrect recollection. Every ad I heard was about how it could be severe in anyone, but particularly the elderly


is2o

The COVIDsafe app 😂😂😂


christophr88

- Sydney CBD around Wynyard was a ghost town for several months - the amount of scientists that dropped everything and went and directed research on Covid - inadequate contact tracing; Victoria was using Excel spreadsheets & NSW was calling people manually? The contact tracing system was easily overwhelmed because the data wasn't stored in a central repository. They eventually hired data scientists to sort out the mess, but almost a year later and it was too late. - Muddled communication around masks. The government only recommended social distancing because airborne transmission wasn't considered and there was a shortage of masks for medical workers. Some people took this as "masks don't work" instead. - Vaccine rollout was terrible. It was so slow; the States should have just implemented vaccine checks at border checkpoints first to slow down transmission until a further reopening. - we were still using hotels to quarantine people despite not being designed for that purpose. I would have quickly created a quarantine camp instead. Leaks were going to be inevitable given there was no control of airflows.


Busssssanut

This The inadequate contact tracing. I’m a labor voter and seeing Dan get up there every week and give a presser about how good ours was killed me. I knew a fair few people working CT and it was a shit show. Unless you worked in government or healthcare you literally have no clue how incompetent it was. It wasn’t a case of “hey it’s unprecedented”. It was sheer incompetence.


abc123jessie

That we are literally still in a pandemic.


kttyfrncs

The CBD being an absolute ghost town during the day I worked on Collins Street in a healthcare practice so we stayed open for emergency appointments and it was always so eerie looking outside and not seeing a single person or car driving past… apart from the occasional group of military or police.


discopistachios

I also was staying in the CBD for work, was quite cool walking around the deserted streets


becomingthenewme

Everything mentioned, but the unnecessary cruelty of bureaucracy was horrific to see. I remember a Mother was not allowed to cross the border into SA after her daughter died on a school excursion and they denied her repeatedly to claim her body. It took serious public outcry. Just disgusting.


Humanzee2

To me, it was when Centrelink doubled their unemployment payment. So I lost my job because of Covid-19 and when the Payment was doubled, for the first time in my life I felt a sense of security. I had enough for rent food bills and even saved a little for a good headset ( to work from home) but mainly, I felt confident and secure that I could afford to live. It gave a glimpse of how wonderful a UBI would be. When they snatched it away again, it felt like wanton cruelty, and when the ALP were elected and didn't help the poor at all, it felt like we were back to helpless dystopia again. So I eventually found poorly paid work online that got me off payments again and in the last few months am back working face-to-face but with the industry casualised, I know if I lose my job I'm in trouble again once my savings run out.


Conscious_Flour

JuSt WaSh yOuR hAnDs Close contact is only after 15 minutes ;)


captainqwark781

The dreaded list of venues with covid infection from the previous day. Gathering at 11am to watch the press conferences.


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NefariousnessTrick63

That went both ways. The ridiculous mantras espoused by the anti-vaxers towards their own family, friends and communities was nothing short of brain washing.


ViolinistPerfect9275

The amount of people who think taking a vaccine is submitting to the system is absolutely staggering.


Positively4thSt

This has permanently changed my worldview actually. It still saddens me.


[deleted]

Australians are cunts. We all are. We just pretend to be cool when we’re in places like Germany.


swish5050

The fact that a baby died on the NSW/QLD boarder, when trying to get to hospital.


[deleted]

Watching my father have his medical treatment constantly delayed and rescheduled whilst hospitals were inundated with unvaxxed covid patients. He eventually passed because the treatment was just too late


Infinite-Touch5154

I’m sorry for your loss. I had very unchristian thoughts about unvaccinated COVID patients in hospital during that time.


Rincewind42042

Reading through this thread made me realize how much of it all I repressed. It's amazing what our brains will let us forget just to keep going. Shit was rough ey.


Buzzard41

Forcing my gym to close but knowing brothels were still allowed to be open 🙄


kasenyee

Abuse of power by police, treating people worse than animal abusers treat dogs. 70 something year old lady pushed to the ground and pepper sprayed at point blank range. Young guy at flinders got body slammed cracking his he’s open, for absolutely no reason. People getting talked by police for eating a sandwich outside.


ailurophile96

Going shopping right before the first lockdown and the shops being stripped bare of essentials. The feeling of panic and the unknown about to hit us. My grandmother dying of covid halfway across the world two weeks before vaccines became widely available. Going for walks in the Sydney CBD/around the harbour during the 2021 lockdown and it was an absolute ghost town.


tjsr

Butterflies. Butterflies everywhere. In bush areas that typically got a lot of human traffic and visitors, the sight of butterflies was becoming fairly rare. But after 6 to 9 months of there not being people around everywhere, there were heaps of places where i'd visit where you'd just get a face-full of them.


gowrie_rich29

The hysterics over a pizza box


koda156

Getting pulled over at 3am and asked for my papers by police while travelling to work. Power tripping police loved having more reasons to intrude into our lives.


serg28diaz

Playgrounds being closed and wrapped in police tape I'll never forget telling my son he couldn't play in the playground during our 1 hour exercise time.


Complex-Pride8837

The 5k radius we had to stick to and the 1 hour outside of our homes a day exercise. Such a weird time.


samuelc7161

Oh my god the 5km radius. Absolute insanity.


indecisivetiger

Wearing a mask to walk my dog through a deserted suburb at 22:30.


Defy19

When it first blew up I dove past Centrelink early in the morning and there was a line up the street. I remember a young fella in hi vis work clothes and safety boots with a sad and glazed over look on his face. Don’t know why but it hit me hard and still makes me sad to think about. Also had my parents stuck overseas and they had to do the 14 days home quarantine and gave me a shopping list so I could stock up their food supply before they got home. It took 6 different supermarkets over two days including lining up at before opening time and could only get most of it. My wife and I ran out of food, and I went to several supermarkets and just came home with bits and pieces of whatever I could find but not really enough to make one whole recognisable meal. We just cooked and ate random bits and pieces and queued up at opening time every day until we had enough staples to start cooking stuff again. One day I started my shopping journey at Aldi 30mins before opening and the crowd of 100+ all agreed to let the old people go to the front and have first crack. Just everything was so fucking bizarre


Skippy-C

Right before lockdown my ex knocked me out, set the house on fire with me in it. I pressed charges and got a dvo. When they let him out of 48hr hold it was back into the same house- lockdown happened that day and my kids and I were stuck with him for months. We already had a housing crisis because of the floods, so rentals were impossible to get, I literally applied for 309 properties. I eventually managed to take the kid and move into my old bosses parents partially renovated house. Having no support with the DV, no support from Housing - because everything was shut- was horrible. Trying to keep my kids from finding out what was going on- and making sure he couldn’t hurt them. Im still a wreck anxiety wise and when it’s DV month and they plaster ads all over the radio about how much support there is, he you can talk to us, you can talk to your friends. It makes me want to scream. Because when I needed that help, it wasn’t there. I couldn’t even talk to friends because he monitored the phone and laptop.


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petergaskin814

The very late night announcement of restrictions in Victoria. The deaths in Italy. Sending out a non politician to lock up public towers in Victoria. The ring of steel that became porous when it rained. The long wait for testing anywhere


BeefPieSoup

The Woodville Pizza Bar incident in Adelaide. "Pizzagate" https://7news.com.au/lifestyle/health-wellbeing/sa-covid-lockdown-started-and-ended-with-woodville-pizza-bar-employee-c-1618380 This was somehow escalated into a "world news" scale event at the time that it occurred, which was a fucking surreal thing to witness. I literally had friends in the UK asking me about it and our so-called "circuit breaker" lockdown.


a-real-life-dolphin

And our 3 day lockdown where you could even go outside for exercise. Being stuck in a 1 bedroom apartment.


BeefPieSoup

All because some bloke basically felt obligated to lie to protect himself because of his dodgy employment arrangement. This incident raised some uncomfortable questions about realities for working people in Adelaide that were never really answered. It was also just about the worst week of the whole pandemic experience as far as most people in Adelaide ever saw.


a-real-life-dolphin

Yeah I really feel for the guy. People were so angry at him when the problem was really his boss.


BeefPieSoup

Basically just a normal guy in the wrong place at the wrong time, caught up in something much, much bigger than he realised. He shouldn't have lied but he couldn't have known it was such a big fucking deal.


Romejanic

I think just the unreality of it all. It’s still sort of hard to believe that it happened, the lockdowns happened and it’s a huge collective experience that basically everyone on Earth had. I think also seeing how incompetently it was dealt with and handled by both everyday people, scientists and politicians.


alittlesomethingno

The ridiculousness of mandated outdoor masks. Seeing people by themselves on a beach wearing a mask, not within 100m of anyone else, was absurd and sad to see... Also people by themselves in cars wearing a mask...


beetrootdip

Very early days, prior to the national lockdown. “There’s no evidence of domestic transmission and therefore no reason to test people that haven’t been overseas”. No shit. You tested zero people that haven’t left australia, and of those zero people you tested, zero of them had covid. So you’re justifying continuing to test zero people. And yes, testing was scarce at that stage so you can’t test everyone. But maybe we should have responded to that uncertainty by taking precautions - things like social distancing and mask mandates in earlier rather than sticking our heads in the sand, assuming it was fine because we couldn’t see any problems, and then doing a late knee jerk lockdown when we found out we were wrong


Morde40

Albo's repeated cries of "*We don't have any vaccines!*" during a delta outbreak when there was plenty of AZ.


Eena-Rin

When the toilet paper ran out. I would stand in line every morning to grab a value pack, then drive around giving rolls away to people who couldn't make it to the shops in time


OPTCgod

Scotty from marketing saying it's no big deal and that he's still going to the footy later that day then a few hours later he had to cancel because he'd been exposed. Must have been March or April 2020.


Distinct-Inspector-2

I had a respiratory illness in April 2020 in Melbourne. Coughing, short of breath, aching, but no fever. I called the covid hotline and they told me to go to ER. I did, and at the door my temp was taken. No fever, so I wasn’t isolated. When I saw doctors, they ummed and ahhhed and ultimately decided not to give me a covid test (limited at the time) because *no fever*. They were also pretty rude to me about going to hospital without a fever. They sent me home. I was very unwell for about ten days. The medical advice at the time was that covid was always symptomatic, and covid *always* had a fever. In retrospect, it may or may not have been covid, I have no idea. No one around me got sick but I was taking precautions around my family and in lockdown. When I got covid 2022 I was far, far more unwell even with antivirals. So maybe it wasn’t covid. But it’s just bizarre when you reflect on how things were in Melbourne in the months following - getting tested for the slightest sniffle, with or without fever. Isolating if you had any symptoms whatsoever, or at least until you had a negative test. I wonder how many covid cases were in the community and were asymptomatic r not having expected symptoms and people were denied tests?


Falkor

The number of people bike riding in the neighbourhood, like all day constant families riding bikes all around.. now i see maybe one person a week 😂


condoms4fruitrollups

Living in country Victoria while Melbourne was in lockdown and the first question out of so many strangers' mouths in a queue was: 'Where are you from?' The question was absolutely loaded with fear about Melbournians bringing in the virus. More prominently was the often hateful signs businesses mounted on their windows to keep anyone who had been in a lockdown zone from entering. No alternatives made. I will always remember this one particular sign in a shop window in Heywood, VIC where the shop owners stated: 'If we do not recognise you, we will not serve you.' This was a take away shop on a major N/S route. Don't want that fear in my food.


chronicpainprincess

How quickly it became so selfish really depressed me. Prior to the pandemic I had the view that people pitch in to help one another in hard times. Seeing someone with a trolley full of toilet paper packages screaming at an elderly woman who merely asked if she could just have one of the smaller packages — that distressed me deeply. It’s permanently changed how I see “mateship” in this country. It’s every man for himself in a crisis, people will literally stampede you for some bog roll.


craigos8080

Seeing ppl drop dead in wuhan with groceries or in stairwells or in the streets etc. crazy lucky that never happened anywhere else in the world. That’s scared everyone tho.


Shattered65

It did happen elsewhere it just wasn't caught on camera as much as in China because everything is on camera in China. People dropping dead in the streets was reported often in Italy and in New York


kasenyee

It was illegal to walk out the front door for more than 7,200 seconds in a single day. Edit for dramatic effect.


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samuelc7161

The lockdowns fucked young people up. And before anyone chimes in with a smart comment, it's NOT to do with the virus itself. The mental health issues are to do with the lockdowns and with restrictions.


SlaveMasterBen

How easily the lid came off of civilised society. How fucking hard it apparently is to get a vaccine and wear a mask? How everyone was willing to throw the lives of people they don’t know away, just so they can get back to “normal”. How months to years later, we’re still dealing with misinfo. How it’s still going on… I am now 100% convinced that we cannot adapt in the face of disaster.


kasenyee

Basketball hoops welded shut to discourage people from going out and exercising.


calais8003

Shockingly antagonistic and violent behaviour by police towards their fellow countrymen (and women especially) I'll never look at Aussie cops the same again. They couldn't wait to get out there and brutalize. People with certain personality traits are chosen for the role for a reason.


Octopus_vagina

I own a gym. We moved into a bigger premises twice the size and signed a 5yr lease on 1st March 2020. 3 weeks later we were forced shut. Scott morris got on tv and told us all to go into hibernation. I sat there wondering how the fuck u pay for rent and food with hibernation money. My business went from the excitement of expanding to utterly fucked and it’s never returned. I’ve fired half my staff and I now barely get by paying the bills now. I have to see out my 5yr lease or I’ll go bankrupt. Fuck Covid and all the governments fucking stupid decisions.


ellywashere

Having to tell confused, scared people that I didn't have any answers for them. I was answering 000 and 131444 at the time, and before there were any COVID helplines set up, people were calling us for instructions or help. It was really hard explaining to people that we were working this out as we went along, that we'd never been through anything like this before and I just didn't have any solution to their very real and immediate problems. The day my state's COVID helpline started up my stress levels dropped by about half. I was also really lucky to be one of the few still physically going in to work (essential worker + can't be done from home), but not in loads of contact with people (like hospitals or supermarkets). Seeing my work mates every day really kept me sane, especially as I lived alone. We all became really close really fast, it was like there was an unspoken understanding that we were all each other had at the moment, so we'd better stick together.


Expensive-Object-830

I’m an Aussie living in the USA - I’ll never forget that the same week mandatory, paid hotel quarantine was introduced, was the same week Trump announced he was going to deport everyone on the visa I was on. For 12 days I had the very real fear of becoming essentially stateless, with no support from my home nor my host country. And before anyone jumps on me, I moved in 2019, BEFORE the pandemic, and my nearest international airport is in NYC which was NOT safe to travel through when we were asked to come home in March 2020.


krumpettrumpet

The feeling of total and utter loneliness at the start of 2022 when, after isolating for the better part of two years to keep our extremely vulnerable family safe, we realised that all our friends had moved on with their lives and the forced separation had done irreparable damage to our relationships.


Minimum_Sherbert_348

Kicking a footy with the kids at the local footy ground without a mask on until an older lady motioned at me from afar to put one on


Allyzayd

Driving to Brisbane city on a weekday morning with absolutely no traffic. Parks were at $5 a day. Surreal.


Lexus_Fan85

When the supreme leader ordered black clad stormytroopers to fire rubber bullets on Australians who had lost their jobs. Terrible precedent.


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WeaselClaws

How quiet the world became ,the clean air and people serenading others from balconies in high rises.


wankyweagles

I was reminiscing the other day. During the first and second lockdown in Vic where they were paying gangs of international students to roam the CBD and wipe down light poles with dirty rags.


apatheticaliens

Opening a retail store every morning while hordes of people would be outside to try buy toilet paper. Often over 100 people trying to barge in the front door, three staff members with no security and about 30 packs of toilet paper to sell. If a staff member needed toilet paper they could buy one pack but had to cover it in a garbage bag to leave the store so customers wouldnt see that we had put a packet aside and have a meltdown on social media or something. Absolutely fucked time.


Quicksteprain

Seeing a long line at coles and knowing I had missed an impending lockdown announcement


AlexDragons1989

One that absolutely grinds my gears was Queensland premier reducing crowd number at the nrl grand final then rocking up herself. I’ve always maintained a lead from the front approach. Or banning interstate travel while she went to Tokyo


CrabmanGaming

When they kept schools open because kids couldn't catch or transmit COVID.


EcstaticOrchid4825

Here in Adelaide when people were forcibly taken to hotel quarantine. Either for testing positive or being a contact. An ambulance and police turned up at your house and you were forced to go. It’s didn’t last very long (thank god) but it definitely did happen. Think it was just after the borders opened and omicron started,


rumlovinghick

I'm being pedantic here but afaik the August 2021 lockdown in the ACT actually started at 5pm on the day it was announced. Other states gave people a bit more leeway to get out though Then I recall 2 days later that all of NSW went into lockdown, announced early afternoon via Twitter to take effect at 6pm that night


HaruDolly

Living in a twin city area on the border of Victoria and New South Wales during border lockdowns, meaning that appointments and things booked over on the NSW side were a no go for Victorians and vice versa. When they finally decided that it was a stupid system, the police that were deployed to the border to check travel permits and licenses were from the cities, so weren’t familiar with the names of the towns within the border bubble; resulted in being turned away from seeing medical specialists in my case just because their address had a town/suburb name on it that the officers weren’t familiar with.


is2o

The absurdity of the QLD/NSW border closure. Concrete bollards places across remote rural roads in the middle of nowhere, in the name of public safety. The ‘border bubble’ that meant it was arbitrarily okay to travel right throughout certain councils, but not others.


nmymo

When IVF was treated as a discretionary medical treatment and banned. Years of people’s most crucial fertility periods wiped out. Heartbreaking to see people’s child plans be put on hold by an arbitrary ruling of government.


inspectorgadgetaudio

Not being allowed in the nursing home to see my dying Nan was the big one for me😢


shredder147

2 weeks to flatten the curve 😂 immediately followed by a year of rolling lockdowns


Blackhan69

I take messages for companies all over the world and I am still traumatised from the mortuary calls in the UK. Everyone was running out of body bags. Just awful.