I've actually got a lot of issues with this article, which I'll enumerate when and if I get time (chief among them being the possibility that it was good fortune, not good policy, which allowed Australia to escape mass dying (so far)). Still an interesting read, though.

Looks like I'll have to lift my game.

I can speak to this a bit:

- All research institutions have some experience of shut down periods (think Christmas and New Year). On the other hand, the unprecedented scale of this obviously means there's some level of people working things out as they go along.

- Identifying what research programs and research infrastructure are essential and must be maintained (i.e. don't go unplugging the tank of liquid nitrogen or the embryo freezer).

- Identifying a smaller crew of essential staff and ensuring they will have access during a lockdown (somebody needs to monitor stuff and feed the animals).

- Providing support for researchers to identify and continue to undertake what research they are able to from home.

- It's important that the centre gives the different organisational units enough lead to work out for themselves what needs to be done, provided there's a record of all operations going to the centre.

- Maintaining open discussion with external research partners about what's going on.

- There will be a big dive in some data over coming months. On the other hand, there will be tremendous wealth of data in other areas. Think pedestrian traffic, internet traffic, monitoring of domestic violence rates, etc.