This is the form of the update we receive occasionally
The 2 important numbers there are active cases (3) and “transfered out”, which means either border jumpers (residents of Zambia, Namibia or RSA who have relatives here and sneak across and are caught by the Botswana Defence Force, or our biggest problem: truckers who failed screening at the border).
So far so good. The government is working very hard, since they know, and have reminded us, we have neither the hospital beds, the technology or the Doctors to deal with big numbers.
The main threat is from South Africa. I use spreadsheets for everything from to-do lists, to recipes, to any kind of thing I feel like listing. Being very mildly OCD, this is a lot of spreadsheets. I track various numbers to see whats going on in SA for fun. A section
An there’s my favourite chart from that, the 7 day m.a. of the positives into testing-turnaround-time-adjusted number of tests
We are just blowing through 18%. A very big number. This is good or bad news, depending on what your preferencial mix (or conviction) of fatality/duration is.
How well Botswana does almost entirely depends on how quickly that SA % number can be turned around, due to our shared border.
Just an opinion.
In answer to some email questions I get:
Here’s a clip from an email I received from the Canadian High Commission in Harare, Zimbabwe, who know I’m in Maun as I registered with them
I’ve had a few of these, but it’s right to ride it out here, rather than running, and returning to my friends who don’t have the choice, a year from now, and it’s beautiful here. Unless I can get my (non-exclusive) Botswana citizenship, then I have much more flexibility. I’m working on it.
Here’s me and my friend, Ren, who went through lockdown with me. We worked together on a successful project for 2 months.
And joined by a couple of Aussies who’ve been trapped on a mine site for 4 months, and escaped for a week off in town
There’s been a lot of drinking.