Dr Sutton at today’s media conference. Image from Channel 9 News and the Age.
Victorians “changed the future” and avoided a nightmare scenario of 650 deaths a day thanks to self isolation, Chief Health Officer, Dr Brett Sutton told a media conference today.
Modelling released by Dr Sutton showed that if COVID-19 had spread out-of-control, more than 58,000 Victorians could have contracted the virus every day, 10,000 patients could have needed intensive care and 7000 could have required ventilators.
State Political Reporter for the Age, Sumeyya Ilanbey also reported Dr Sutton warned that any rapid relaxation of the restrictions could be disastrous.
“We have averted exactly this prediction [after strict social distancing rules were enacted],” Dr Sutton said.
“[The modelling] uses assumptions based on the experience of countries overseas as well as data from Australia to inform what might have occurred had we only had a case isolation and contact processes in place without social distancing measures.
“We saw this modelling and we changed the future two months ago by virtue of what we saw.”
Read the entire article in the Age.
