Late on Thursday, epidemiologists from the Doherty Institute, Melbourne, released what the Chief Medical Officer described as “nowcasting”: modelling that uses data from the previous 14 days to more accurately understand the present state of the COVID-19 epidemic.

In short, the findings are reassuring and suggest the inconvenience of social isolation is helping control the spread of SARS-CoV-2 in Australia.

It also indicates the spectre of ‘unidentified community transmission’ is very unlikely indeed.

This should be especially reassuring for healthcare workers, who may worry about coming into contact with COVID-positive patients presenting with a non-COVID problem.