Each day the Victorian government posts the COVID-19 cases by postcode and LGA, but if you want to look at yesterdays data you can't, it's gone. That makes it hard to get an idea of what's happening over time.
Is the situation in your postcode and the surrounding postcodes getting better or worse? With the information presented by the Victorian government you don't know.
To the Victorian government's credit they do however make the data available for download and since you can download the data you can create whatever application you want using the data.
I decided I needed a better tool to help myself, family and friends.
What I wanted was to be able to easily see information for my postcode and the postcodes around me.
What I also wanted was to be able to see the number of new cases for each day for the last seven days.
By having the last seven days of data I get two things.
1. The ability to see if the situation is getting better or worse.
2. The ability to see which postcodes around me have less cases and thus potentially lower risk.
I should add the data provided by the Victorian government is for where people live, not where they acquired COVID-19. I figure most people probably don't realise they've caught COVID-19 until they develop symptoms, or others they know are diagnosed and they need to isolate. Before isolating however they may have been out in their local community for a couple of days whilst infectious.
Once a person is diagnosed with COVID-19 they're quarantined so really I consider the first few days were people are COVID-19 positive but still out in the community the highest risk. These people work and that often isn't in their local community, but when they're at home, they could be out shopping, socialising or exercising, and it's then there's a risk to others when they're out in the local community.
Low case numbers in an area reduces the chances of being exposed and anything that can reduce our risk of exposure I consider a good thing. By shopping, socialising and exercising in areas with low COVID-19 cases numbers gives me a feeling I might be reducing my risk to COVID-19. It might make no difference but at least I feel like I'm doing something positive to reduce the risk.
The web page I've written for Victorian - COVID-19 cases by postcode can be found at Victoria COVID-19 Cases By Postcode (onlineconnections.com.au).
I live in Templestowe which has the postcode of 3106. A suburb near me is Eltham (postcode 2095) but unfortunately it isn't included in the nearest 10 results because the postcode also includes a number of other suburbs and when the centre of all the suburbs is taken into account, the postcode is further away than other suburbs. That means I need to check the results for Eltham separately, or what I've done, is to replace the last postcode with the 3095 postcode.
By selecting the option to find the 10 nearest postcodes I get the following results.
1. The postcode 3111 (Donvale) has the lowest numbers. Perhaps a good place to socialise or exercise. There's no shopping facilities in 3111.
2. Postcodes 3093 and 3094 have low numbers. There's a good shopping strip with Aldi and also areas to socialise or exercise.
3. Compared with other areas around Melbourne even the worst area of Doncaster still isn't too bad.
4. Most areas are trending down except for 3106 and 3095.
5. Postcode 3105 has a Coles so that's looking like the best area if shopping at Coles.
6. We normally shop at 3108 (Doncaster), 3109 (Doncaster East) or 3095 (Eltham) but really this should be reconsidered due to the higher case numbers.
Whilst the Victorian government doesn't give me the information I'd really like, all hotspots and businesses where people have been exposed, information on whether exposed at work or home, at least some data is available I can use and that's appreciated.
Hopefully the site can help you as well.
Kelvin
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