[game author here] Politically, eradication was never a real option in Czechia.

Improved contact tracing and testing is something we and the experts we worked with strongly supported. And we did consider adding them to the game. At the end, these features ended on the "cutting floor". We felt these features would a) be complicating the game too much b) they would lead to an optimal strategy too far away from what the the real country was doing. Unfortunately, real Czechia didn't use summer and fall 2020 to implement these "smart measures". In winter 2020/2021 only crude restrictive measures were available to manage the incoming virus surge.

Nor was it politically an option in Aus, kinda. They’ve gone to great lengths to avoid using the words eradication and elimination, but Melbourne/Victoria got to zero cases late 2020 and released the lockdown and everyone had a great summer. Except for a couple of scares. The trick was to show people what life could be like with zero after it had been taken away for so long, and now everyone in this city gets it. All of the other states except apparently NSW learned the lesson from afar.

I think you’re right that the ability to pull off zero (as opposed to 10-20/day) rests squarely on the availability of extremely competent and fast testing and tracing. It’s either that or unacceptably draconian measures. Scaling up contact tracing capability To that level in Victoria took months because it’s really hard, so if you don’t see the slow movement on that front, it’s easy to see zero cases as a political impossibility. Maybe that’s what’s going on in NSW right now, alongside people getting used to the strictness necessary to make it work.

You obviously get how these things interact since you built the game mechanics simulating public trust in government in response to measures. It’s no different from the rest of them, it just only works at the small end of the log scale. And to get to the small end and make zero cases an option you have to play the rest of the game like a champ.

Endgame for Victoria is that our leader, who according to large swathes of Australian media is basically a dictator, is probably getting re-elected by a significant margin. There should be a button for answering 90 minutes of press questions live on TV every day for 4 months straight.

As a Sydneysider, I'm disappointed and feel betrayed by Gladys. I'd have preferred a swift and tight lockdown rather than this pissweak setting that most of Sydney seems to be flaunting. It's clearly not going to work, and she'll open up NSW with infections to sky rocket.

I'd vote for Dan if I could.

> like Aus/NZ

Well, we haven't eradicated it have we. Keeps popping up.

We'll only know if the lockdowns are worthwhile after few years of accounting.

We already know they have been absolutely worthwhile to date. We've lived with very occasional lockdowns, and apart from that life has been normal for most people (apart from those in hospo, overseas tourism etc.), and there have been negligible death or serious illness from COVID-19.

That's not to say the same equation holds true from here on in. Constant revaluation is required.

Maybe if you didn't live in Victoria. For Victorians, last year was anything but life as normal.

Still much less lockdown and fewer deaths than e.g. the UK. On the whole it think the cost was worth it, both in lives and economically

Cases keep being imported, and escaping quarantine. Not quite 'popping up'.

The game could have multiple levels of 'border closure'; Australia has relaxed border restrictions over the course of the pandemic.

It's unfortunate, but you can't quite get rid of it that way, because you keep playing whack-a-mole... if one case gets through the sieve, or forgotten about, or it goes into mustelids or some other animal and then goes back into humans... then what will you do?

We need to rapidly expand vaccination instead along with increasing equity with regards to other countries, especially poorer ones.

The game however gives you no means to whack the mole. Only country global measures. So the game does not let you "open up" without the number of infections rising again to unacceptable levels, but will punish you with low government trust. At the same time you cannot trace cases and cannot have local lockdowns. It does not represent reality.

I think the game "trace case" when the number of cases is less than 1000. I'm not sure how it's implemented, probably the increase rate changes when you pass that threshold.

Australia hasn’t eradicated the virus though and has botched a vaccine rollout. The federal government has relied on border control measures which include threatening Australian citizens with jail time if they try to return to their country.

>threatening Australian citizens with jail time if they try to return to their country. //

This seems like an obvious expedient during a pandemic? I guess, if you can set up facilities (crucially staffing) to allow repatriation with full quarantining that may be preferable.

How would you rather they behaved? Allowing non-essential international travel is idiotic in such circumstances.

The game is modeled around mid-sized European nations. Westerners care so much about privacy and freedom that hard lockdowns and extensive contact tracing is politically impossible.

Australians and New Zealanders are westerners too

Everything seems to be "west" if you go far enough and allow for sufficient north/south drift.

now that the UK's soft power is crumbling so hard that it reveals them to simply be an island of hooligans, the entire Commonwealth inherits this brand too

in response to what you are saying, we can't exclude the Commonwealth from "the West", but maybe it's about time to make a term that does essentially do that. The complement to the union in graph theory. The West except the Commonwealth.

NZ is not a great example of an average Western country, with regards to a pandemic.

For one thing, it is a small and remote island.

For another thing, it supplies most of the world's sterile bovine serums because the country has never had a case of mad cow disease. Laugh all you want, but that's a lucrative market and they are very good at border controls.

Almost exactly the same size as the island of Great Britain, and while distanced somewhat as the crow flies, precisely one (1) plane fight away from many places.

Hmm... Remote, yes, but wouldn't describe it as a small island. It's actually a collection of island, of a similar land mass to Great Britain or Japan.

But yes, being remote, and being islands surrounded by lots of ocean definitely helps.

NZ is not a single island :)

Also, both of our largest islands are far larger than Czechia. The South Island/Te Waipounamu is over twice the size of Czechia.

Ok, but the core issue you're intentionally ignoring is that nobody wanders into New Zealand without being vetted by border control. Except for a couple of oddballs who boat in (to a couple specific ports) every single person comes through an international import.

The core issue you and everyone else who makes this islands arguement is intentionally ignoring is that no country has been flooded with covid spreaders through a practical inability to enforce its borders. That Czechia or anywhere else doesn't only have people coming in through a couple specific locations is a policy decision. They could effectively be an island if they wanted to.

The US has tried and failed for 80 years to close its southern border.

Unless you're suggesting the US station ten million soldiers on the border and shoot anyone who tries to enter (hint: this is not politically feasible) closing the US is hopeless.

How much Covid came from Mexico, and not through the airports? The Mexican border is a trojan horse in this discussion.

It doesn't matter "how much" came through. If even a handful of cases come through the border, and you have no internal restrictions, it's exponential spread. You either have 100% hard borders, or there's no point.

Sure, it's definitely easier to enter Czechia illegally than NZ.

...so how much Covid was brought to Czechia by illegal entry?

Glad this lesson was finally learned, if nothing else.

And border control.