The head of Australia’s most-populated state a move to close its border with coronavirus-hit Victoria marks a new phase in the country’s pandemic.
New South Wales Prime Minister Gladys Berejiklian was a critic of other states that closed borders to her regional capital Sydney had Australia’s largest numbers of Covid-19 cases.
But her stance on keeping Australia’s internal borders open changed when the situation in the Victorian capital Melbourne became unprecedented.
The overwhelming majority of news cases detected in Melbourne in recent weeks were from community transmission.
Ms Berejiklian said the vast majority of other patients across Australia were infected overseas or had been infected by a returning traveller.
She said: “What is occurring in Victoria has not yet occurred anywhere else in Australia. It’s a new part of the pandemic and, as such, it requires a new type of response.”
NSW police will close the Victorian border on Tuesday, but some flights and trains services would continue for travellers who are given permits and exemptions.
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