The Australian city of Sydney on Saturday ordered the closure of construction sites, banned non-essential retail and threatened fines for employers coming to the office for employees as new COVID-19 cases surged across the city for three weeks. are.
Officials in the state of New South Wales, of which Sydney is the capital, have also banned hundreds of thousands of people in the city’s western suburbs – the worst-affected areas – from leaving their immediate neighborhoods for work, as they had previously closed 111 of the 24 New cases were registered. hours, up from 97 a day earlier.
The state also recorded one additional death from the virus, taking the total to 913 since the start of the year and three more since the pandemic began.
“I can’t remember a time when our state has been challenged to such an extent,” NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian told a televised news conference.
The city of 5 million people, Australia’s largest, has been under lockdown since 26 June, with a planned end date of 30 July, after an airport transit driver brought the virus to the community and caused an outbreak of a highly contagious version of the virus. According to authority.
Over 1,000 people have tested positive in the city and adjoining districts. Of most concern to health leaders is the number of infectious people who were active in the community before testing positive, with 29 reported on Saturday, in line with previous days.
“We are chasing our tail in terms of cases,” state chief health officer Kerry Chant told the news conference.
NSW Deputy Commissioner of Police Gary Verboy said the “speed of police response would increase” in Greater Sydney and regional areas.
Stores that can remain open in Sydney include supermarkets, pharmacies and hardware outlets. Officials said all construction work, including cleaning, property maintenance and house renovation, should stop by July 30.
People living in Sydney’s three local government districts – which have a total population of 612,000 – were banned from leaving their district to work, unless they were emergency workers. The city already has a work-from-home directive for businesses, but employers who have asked employees to come into the office could be fined up to $10,000 ($7,402.00).
Neighboring Victoria state also saw a jump in daily COVID-19 cases from six to 19 the previous day, raising fears that it may extend the shorter lockdown that ends on Tuesday.
Victoria and Greater Sydney have a combined population of around 12 million people, meaning that almost half of Australia’s population is under some form of lockdown.
One in all new cases in Victoria was active in the community before diagnosis, but each case was linked to a known chain of transmission, Victorian Health Minister Martin Foley said.
Australia avoided the high infection and fatality numbers of many other countries in the early stages of the pandemic because of a vocal response, which included closing borders, stay-at-home orders and economic stimulus measures.
But 18 months later, the government is facing criticism over its sluggish vaccine rollout. According to government figures, more than 10% of Australia’s 25 million people have been fully vaccinated, a fraction of the rates in the United States and Britain.
Nevertheless, Australia’s death rate from the novel coronavirus is still low compared to more than 900 deaths out of some 31,500 cases.
The Australian economy came back to life after plunging into recession last year, but the latest lockdowns and state border closures threaten to propel it back into negative growth.
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