Melbourne, Feb 17 (AFP/APP):Stay-at-home orders will be lifted for six million Australians in the state of Victoria Wednesday after a successful five-day lockdown, allowing businesses to reopen and some spectators to return to the Australian Open tennis tournament.
Snap restrictions were ordered last Friday after a small outbreak of the more infectious UK coronavirus variant prompted fears Australia’s successful battle to contain the pandemic could be undone. The five-day closure of schools and businesses now appears to have limited the outbreak — which was linked to a quarantine hotel for overseas travellers — to 19 people, with no new cases reported Wednesday. Snap lockdowns ordered by authorities in Australia and New Zealand appear to have worked well in controlling new waves of infections — in contrast to Europe, where restrictions have been less rigourous.
Victoria Premier Daniel Andrews said businesses and schools can reopen and residents can host small groups of visitors from 11.59 pm Wednesday, hailing the “short, sharp circuit-breaker” that got on top of the virus. “If we had been open throughout this outbreak… total case numbers would be much, much higher and it is a certainty that I would not be reporting zero cases today,” he said. Andrews had warned residents the strain was “hyper infectious”, prompting fears among Melburnians who last year spent more than 100 days in a lockdown to contain an outbreak that infected thousands and killed about 800 people. The latest five-day restrictions appear to have limited the cluster’s growth to just six new cases since the lockdown began.
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