- Australia has expanded its Covid-19 blockade beyond Sydney.
- Prime Minister Scott Morrison came under fire for the slow introduction of the vaccine, and only 22% of Australians over 16 years of age were fully vaccinated.
- The prolonged blockade of Australia’s most populous city, Sydney, may plunge the country’s economy into negative growth.
Fearing that the coronavirus may have spread from Sydney to the countryside, Australian authorities on Monday extended the Covid-19 lockdown to the rural town of Tamworth, carried by infected persons who violated the travel ban.
The governor of New South Wales, Gladys Berejiklian, announced the blockade of an agricultural town 414 kilometers (257 miles) northwest of Sydney, where it was previously known that Covid-19 had been there.
“As a precaution, health experts recommended that we lock down Tamworth for a week,” Berejiklian told reporters in Sydney.
Officials also urged people in the Byron Bay area to be tested after a man traveled from Sydney, the epicenter of the state’s outbreak, to a tourist attraction about 767 kilometers north.
New South Wales has reported 283 locally infected Covid-19 cases in the past 24 hours, up from 262 a day ago.
Although Sydney has now entered its seventh week of lockdown, the state has been working hard to contain the surge of the highly contagious delta virus.
Neighbouring Victoria stated that it will relax restrictions after reporting 11 new Covid-19 cases, the same as the previous day.
Most of the new cases in Victoria have been contagious and spent in the community, but Governor Daniel Andrews said that the blockade outside the state capital Melbourne will be lifted later on Monday.
Melbourne will continue to be locked down-this is the sixth time since the pandemic began-at least until August 12.
In Brisbane, the capital of Queensland, authorities reported four new local cases on Monday, the first day after the city lifted home restrictions.
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Prime Minister Scott Morrison came under fire for the slow introduction of the vaccine, and only 22% of Australians over 16 years of age were fully vaccinated.
A poll conducted by the Australian newspaper showed that his public approval rate has fallen to the lowest level since the pandemic began.
After Australia managed to keep its pandemic numbers low, Morrison received high ratings early last year. It reported approximately 36,250 cases and 939 deaths, including a woman in her 90s who died in Sydney on Monday.
Morrison has said that by the end of this year, all Australians over the age of 16 will have access to the vaccine. The prospects for achieving this goal have been improved after the pharmaceutical regulator temporarily approved the Moderna vaccine on Monday.
Morrison said that 10 million doses of vaccine will arrive this year, and the millionth dose is expected in September.
Australia has ordered 25 million doses of Moderna vaccine.
Finance Minister Josh Frydenberg said last month that the extended blockade in Sydney, Australia’s most populous city, will push the country’s A$2 trillion ($1.5 trillion) economy to negative growth this quarter. .
Neighboring New Zealand has not had a community case since February. It said on Monday that 11 of the 21 crew members on the La Plata container ship off the north coast had tested positive for Covid-19.
As a precautionary measure, 94 port workers who worked on the ship while the ship was docked are being contacted and stopped working before the test result is negative.
