July 5
It was Sunday and I was due to go back to work having had a very nice time on holidays.
In the meantime the pandemic had been with us in Australia affecting our lives since March. We were now in the second quarter, a second 3 month period of living with the virus.
Numbers in Victoria were going up, as were American southern and fly over states. As part of the West saw a bit of a respite in numbers the disease was accelerating the havoc it wreaked across the rest of the globe.
The number of locked down post codes had expanded from ten to twelve.
Businesses in these areas were back to having restrictions, for example cafes only doing take-away.
The World Health Organisation reported globally there had been 11,128,629 confirmed cases with a daily increase of 204,438. There had been 528,238 deaths with a daily increase of 5,191.
In Australia there had been 8,362 confirmed cases with a daily increase of 107. The number of deaths was 104.
In Canada there had been 105,091 confirmed cases with a daily increase of 319. There had been 8,663 deaths with a daily increase of 21. As July unfolded daily increases in case numbers and deaths would be consistently lower than figures from April and May. They were still too high but it was something to give hope potentially.
In the United Kingdom there had been 286,724 confirmed cases with a daily increase of 579. The number of deaths were 44,198 with a daily increase of 67.
In India there had been 673,165 confirmed cases with a daily increase of 24,850. There had been 19,268 deaths with a daily increase of 613.
In the United States of America there had been 2,776,366 confirmed cases with a daily increase of 51,933. The number of deaths 129,226 with a daily increase of 745.
I had a really nice week but that was not the experience of millions around the world. I just wanted to take a moment to remember that.
-Lloyd Marken
Back to the Drawing Board Productions 
I have noticed a worrying trend here this week. The Coronavirus has been slowly ‘slipping’ off the main news broadcasts. The weather and the schools examination fiasco has relegated Covid-19 news to a ‘sideshow’.
Best wishes, Pete.
How would you estimate their grades? It’s no use taking what the schools say because a very large proportion quite simply cheat and give As and Bs to their Cs. The results of a mock exam are the best, but lots of schools don’t bother with doing mock exams.
On the other side, if candidates are not forecast a top grade the universities will immediately reject them out of hand.
Putting it bluntly, the problem is beyond solution. Candidates forecast the grades they need should accept it, end of problem. Candidates who are disappointed should be allowed a retake of the school year, retaining any real results they have so far.
I don’t claim to have any solution, John. But it is notable from reading some tables of results yesterday that most pupils at fee paying private schools have achieved good results. I used the term fiasco, as that was how they described it on the BBC news report I watched before leaving my comment on Lloyd’s post.
Best wishes, Pete.
Best wishes Pete.
I certainly enjoy hearing from both you and Pete. It keeps me informed about what it feels like to be going through this in the UK. Stay safe John.
I got to admit this threw me, I was like where was I talking about school grades in this post and then I saw it in the comments. 🙂
I do remember around April or May it was noted how COVID was the only news we had. I remember the first peeks of new items on new.com.au with stuff like Harry and Meghan and thinking that they were obviously testing the waters. Certainly the world can be burning and if numbers are down in your country it doesn’t seem to get a lot of focus. It’s why I have tried to look beyond my borders while at the same time realising that as a diary it has to be about my perspective. I have not heard about the schools examination fiasco but there is a lot of talk here about the need for reform in universities. When I heard that, I worry about a lot of people losing their jobs.
Thanks for Sara Cooper and for you bringing her to help cheer us up. Stay Safe.
Hey Don, pretty somber post so I’m glad Sara cheered you up. I enjoy watching her.