COVID-19 Official information thread

[Cage]

Woolies are opening at 0700 and till 0800 will only admit the elderly and those with disabilities.

Great idea, lots of good publicity for them, but little reward for those it's meant to help. From all reports it's been a shambles to date.

I've been getting by without an immune system for two years, so the threats this virus poses are something I've been dealing with for a while.

Yesterday morning my younger brother, the 76 year old one, decided to take advantage of the offer, and arrived at his local Woolies a bit after 0630. There was already about 100 people there, some obviously having done an overnighter. He estimated that there were around 500 folk there at 0700.

When the door went up it was on for young and old, with the more mobile folk beating the others on walking frames and in wheel- chairs to the aisle with paper products, only to find .............,.,.,.. about 12 packs of loo paper, no paper towels, tissues, sanitiser.

Shelves with rice, pasta, packaged meat and pretty much anything else that you can store or freeze were empty.

I assume Woolies intentions were honourable, but my brother was quite upset by the sight of our elderly (Yeah, I'm well and truly in the category) walking around with a basically empty trolley, and tears in their eyes.

Come on Woolies, you can do better than that, or perhaps Coles, an AU company I think, (used to be at anyrate) can pick up the baton and do the job properly.

Basic things I've been doing are to only order coffee in a takeaway cup, don't use a cup, glass or cutlery that someone else has used. Dishwashers are basically used to remove grime and are not designed to sterilise. On the odd occasion I go to a club or pub these days, I will only drink from a Stubby. If you are a wine drinker take your own glass to dinner with you.

Nobody seems to know just how bad this threat is, but if you use some common sense you can get through it.

Stay safe everyone.