A is for Abundance (i.e to exercise a caution of): the only justification required for our leaders to breach our human rights, impose medical interventions and criminalise natural human behaviours on the grounds of ‘safety’. Also applied selectively to allow some protests but to ban others.
B is for Borders (closure of): the pointless and polarising effort to create arbitrary divisions within a single country to aid the popularity of incumbent premiers and to preserve the purity of West Australians.
C is for Curfew: Something only your parents and Dan Andrews have been able to impose successfully. For Victorians this was an unnecessary and draconian imposition by an unnecessary and draconian despot.
D is for Vitamin D. Like most other important pandemic preventative health measures (like exercising and drinking less alcohol), this cheap and abundant intervention dropped off the radar of public health messaging to prioritise cosy governmental partnerships with Big Pharma. Two jabs good, five jabs better.
E is for Emergency use authorisation: the convenient and apparently open-ended relaxation of vital ethical rules and protocols around drug development because ‘it’s an emergency’.
F is for Flatten the curve: the longest two weeks in history.
G is for Granny killer: anyone who was anti-lockdown or wary about participating in an experimental vaccination trial at the risk of societal shunning after noticing healthy young people die of post-injection blood clots.
H is for Hotel quarantine: two words that should never again be used in conjunction.
I is for Immunity (i.e. natural): a fundamental medical concept forgotten overnight by 98 per cent of the medical profession including those who just urged us to ‘re-charge our immunity’ with yet another booster.
J is for Job-keeper: an allowance designed to pay Peter by robbing Peter after the government closed Peter’s business down because it was deemed ‘non-essential’ (i.e the business produced good and/or services and couldn’t be run from home via laptop). Now we have an inflation crisis as a result.
K is for Kids: kept at home and isolated from their peers and healthy routines ostensibly to keep Granny safe. Great news for teachers though! Not so much for literacy and numeracy.
L is for Lockdown: because who could foresee that keeping people under house arrest for more than 200 days might lead to a mental health crisis which will last for years to come? And yes, the poor and single mothers were disproportionately impacted by this lunacy.
M is for Masks: not any good for preventing disease transmission but great for choking dolphins. A testament to the power of political propaganda, groupthink, and superstition. Also a boon for the ugly.
N is for Nicola Spurrier: South Australia’s chief medic who kept the people safe by asking them to refrain from touching errant balls drifting in their direction at Adelaide Oval. Like the CCP, our chief medics really believed, until relatively recently, that Covid-zero was possible.
O is for Obese: a modifiable risk factor for Covid mortality never discussed openly by our chief health officers. Also conveniently omitted from reporting were details about the ages and co-morbidities of those who died. (See also Scomo.)
P is for playgrounds: wicked dens of filth and disease closed by Victorian CHO Brett Sutton lest children were exposed to sunlight and exercise.
Q is for Queensland hospitals; reserved only for ‘our people’ according to Queenslander Annastacia Paluszczuk. Did she mean Queenslanders, or corporate cronies? (See also Wagner.)
R is for Rationing: of toilet paper. In peacetime. For a respiratory illness. Because our governments thought that only good could come of terrifying the population with inflated mortality rates and overblown rhetoric.
S is for Scomo: the ex-PM who seemed to believe that banning Australian citizens from entering and leaving their own country would win him an election. Also created and succumbed to the useless National Cabinet and secretly appointed himself to five ministries. Passively watched the fragmentation of the Commonwealth and the suspension of democracy occur under his stewardship. With friends like Mr Morrison…
T is for Track and Trace: Remember when the government texted you at 3 am to tell you that someone you walked past at the supermarket five days ago sat next to someone who knew someone who touched a ball at Adelaide Oval? And now you had to stay at home for two weeks?
U is for Unions: Champions of the workers unless you were one of the thousands laid off in construction, hospitality or tourism.
V is for Visitors to hospital: banned from seeing loved ones on their deathbeds in order to prevent the dying from contracting Covid. Or something. Many of these pointless rules still apply in our hospitals (See also Masks.)
W is for Wagner: The family who operated the short-lived Wellcamp quarantine facility in Queensland which cost the taxpayer $220 million. Opened just in time for the end of the pandemic.
X is for X marks the spot: a green dot telling you where to stand when a) queuing for toilet paper or b) waiting outside Centrelink for a Job-keeper application after your small business was closed down. One of a number of now abandoned superstitions such as the embarrassing ‘’elbow bump’ and the removal of physical menus from restaurants.
Y is for Yvette D’Ath: Queensland Health Minister whose health service is currently collapsing under the weight of avoidable, predictable, post-pandemic demand. To be fair to her, the other states are also doing horribly. Been to an emergency department recently?
Z is for Zoe Buhler: the pregnant woman in pyjamas handcuffed and arrested on her own house in front of her family by thuggish police acting on behalf of a totalitarian state. Deafening silence from the Human Rights lobby and from the legal profession about the catch-all charge of ‘incitement’.
