What happened today, Sunday 15 August 2021
We’ll leave it there for now. Here are today’s main developments:
- One million extra Pfizer doses are on the way to Australia after the Morrison government reached a deal with Poland. About half of the doses will be sent direct to Sydney, where they will be used to vaccinate young workers in the current LGA’s “of concern”.
- New South Wales recorded 415 new cases, with four more people losing their lives, including a woman who was fully vaccinated. The chief health officer, Kerry Chant, said vaccination was “not a silver bullet” and that people would need to follow tough new health restrictions to get case number down. The premier, Gladys Berejikilan, said it was almost impossible to eradicate the Delta variant.
- Victoria reported 25 new cases, including four yet to be linked to current outbreaks. The mystery cases are a serious concern, according to the premier, Daniel Andrews warned it would be a challenge to end the current lockdown unless the situation improves.
- There were two new cases in the ACT, amid record testing. The chief minister, Andrew Barr, welcomed NSW’s statewide lockdown.
- There were no new cases in Queensland, which has further bolstered its police presence on the border with NSW.
See you tomorrow.
Updated
Crackdown on illegal Victoria gatherings
Police are cracking down on large gatherings in breach of Victoria’s lockdown restrictions, reports AAP.
In the inner city, dozens congregated for a takeaway drink pub crawl event on the streets of Richmond on Saturday, while in Northcote about 200 people gathered for a street party.
On the Mornington Peninsula, one resident had made plans to invite a thousand people to a house party with a DJ and a stage.
There are also reports of a 100-person engagement party held in Melbourne which a Covid-positive guest may have attended.
An online account for Melbourne’s Jewish community has advised a community member has tested positive and visited supermarkets in Balaclava while infections.
It is believed they may have attended the engagement party.
Acting Superintendent Greg Hinton told reporters on Sunday police had increased patrols and were examining social media activity, and also looking into liquor licensing breaches
News of the illegal gatherings comes as the state records 25 new local infections and the end of lockdown recedes from view.
Premier Daniel Andrews told reporters that illegal visits and gatherings are “not worth it”.
“None of us should be doing anything that potentially spreads this virus,” he said on Sunday.
Health authorities say 21 of the cases are linked to known outbreaks and 12 have been in isolation throughout their infectious period.
The unlinked cases include a cleaner in Greater Dandenong, a construction worker in West Footscray and two St Kilda cases.
Updated
Victorian authorities will launch pop-up testing in the St Kilda East area, amid claims of unauthorised private prayer gatherings being held during Melbourne’s lockdown.
Jeroen Weimar, the state’s Covid commander, said on Sunday two cases had been reported in St Kilda East, home to an Orthodox Jewish community in Melbourne.
Weimar said additional testing facilities were being set up today at Caulfield hospital and other sites.
On Saturday, the Australian Jewish News reported claims there had been a “number of illegal minyans have been held in private houses in Melbourne”. Minyans are prayer gatherings with a minimum of 10 people.
Guardian Australia has not independently verified the allegations, but in a statement published on its Facebook page on Sunday, the Rabbinical Council of Victoria said:
Last night the Rabbincal Council of Victoria … issued a statement together with the Melbourne Beth Din urging the community “to comply with all government restrictions without exception and to follow the relevant health instructions”.
For the removal of any possible doubt, this includes all illegal gatherings, including for prayer. We implore anybody considering flouting the law to refrain from doing so. We unreservedly condemn such actions, which bring risk and shame to the entire community.
Daniel Aghion, the Jewish Community Council of Victoria president, said in a statement on Facebook:
We are proud that the majority of our community are doing the right thing, like most Victorians. We are disappointed to learn that a small group have not been following mandatory lockdown restrictions. We call on those people to do the right thing. The virus does not discriminate.
Updated
NSW Labor wants test and isolate payment extended statewide
A test and isolate payment of $320 will start next week for workers aged 17 and over who have symptoms of Covid-19 and live in government areas of concern, reports AAP.
But the NSW Labor leader Chris Minns wants that payment made available statewide.
“The test and isolate payment must be in every part of NSW,” Minns said on Sunday.
In Victoria, the payment is paid at $450, is available statewide, and has been in place since July last year.
Updated
NSW police minister blames anti-lockdown protest for spike in Covid cases
The NSW police minister, David Elliott, has linked the current spike in cases to anti-lockdown protests held in the CBD last month.
He told Nine’s Today Show:
I think it is too much of a coincidence that we had a reckless gathering three weeks ago, and now these numbers just keep going (up).
I think it is too much of a coincidence. There is no doubt in my mind at least some of these cases that we are seeing at the moment had their genesis at the protest. Which is why, if they try to do it again, the NSW police, with the assistance of any other agency we need, will make sure that the response is the same.
Updated
Linda Burney, Labor’s social services and Indigenous affairs spokesperson, has reiterated Anthony Albanese’s call for the ADF to help with the vaccine rollout in western Sydney.
People are doing their best, but they just can’t do it to scale to reach the number of people that need to be reached.
Burney also strongly criticised the federal government over vaccination rates among Indigenous communities, after the virus this week spread to western New South Wales.
We know all of the cases in Bourke yesterday ... were Aboriginal people, young Aboriginal people. This is a rolling, unmitigated disaster. Scott Morrison made much ado today about getting a million vaccines. It is catch-up and plugging holes. Nothing more.
Labor is calling on the federal government to publish daily data on Indigenous vaccination rates and “come clean” about exactly where those doses are going.
Burney said today:
Vaccine rates in these parts of New South Wales is so low compared to the national average. It’s fine to talk about the figures that are high level and the average across Australia, across states. And in some of those communities, the vaccine rate is low as 2%.
Updated
Another 163,176 vaccine doses delivered in 24 hours - the best Sunday result so far in the rollout. Now 15.17m doses administered nationally. 47.76 per cent of adults 16+ have had at least one shot and 26.06 per cent are fully vaxxed. Latest seven day dose rate is 1.53m shots.
— Tom McIlroy (@TomMcIlroy) August 15, 2021
Kate Banville has this story:
An Afghan interpreter who was by the side of an Australian soldier slain in battle says he has been abandoned by the Australian government and is resigned to his all but certain death, as Taliban forces seize back swathes of the country.
Hi everyone. It’s Luke Henriques-Gomes here. Thanks to Josh for his work today.
I’ll now handover to my colleague Luke Henriques-Gomes to take you through the remainder of the afternoon.
Wild winds hit Tasmania, closing roads and bridges
Strong winds have hit Tasmania, closing roads and blowing a boat from a trailer on the Tasman Bridge, AAP reports.
A severe weather warning for damaging north-westerly winds has been issued for the entire state.
Locations which may be affected include Devonport, Burnie, Launceston, St Helens, Swansea, Strahan, New Norfolk and Hobart.
Wind gusts have reached 156 km/h at Maatsuyker Island, 124 km/h in the Hartz Mountains and Cape Bruny, 122 km/h Scotts Peak, and 119 km/h at Mt Wellington.
Wind gusts in Hobart have hit 98 km/h.
It’s predicted the winds should clear to the east in the evening.
Earlier on Sunday, emergency services had to clear the Tasman Bridge after the winds blew a boat off a trailer onto the road.
In Hobart’s CBD, a roof came off a building, closing Macquarie, Davey and Harrington streets.
At Bruny Island, trees are blocking roads, there is water over the road at the Neck, and the ferry between Kettering and Bruny Island is not running.
The state emergency service is warning people to secure outdoor items, check on family and neighbours, and beware of downed trees and power lines.
Snow down to about 400 metres is likely for late Sunday.
Updated
The NSW Labor leader, Chris Minns, has called for the Covid test payment in NSW to be extended to people across the state:
No one can be disadvantaged because they’ve done the right thing and come forward to get a test.
Obviously there are many testing centres that are being overwhelmed at the moment, as a result of an influx of people that have deemed it necessary to go and get a test that we need to do more, to make sure that the backlog is addressed as soon as possible. We are hearing stories of people having to wait seven days in order to get test results back, while at the same time, it’s a mandatory requirement for them to be tested every three days. In some instances, they’ve got to go and get another test before the first result is even in their hands.
Now that’s not good enough. It’s simply can’t work. And we run the risk of people defying the health orders in relation to this because they can’t get the testing that’s required of them by NSW law. So more testing centres, particularly in the LGAs, more testing centres, particularly in Western Sydney. That’s really the epicentre of where the workers of NSW that require these tests and are currently circulating in our community are required to go.
He also criticised the NSW government for announcing the statewide lockdown yesterday “by tweet”:
It must be done in a clear and concise way by the NSW government. There are too many people involved. The stakes are just too high and clear and direct communication from the government is required shows that people can comply with the health orders.
My sense is the millions of people that live in this state want to comply with the health orders. They’ve postponed their lives, their social life, their education, weddings, funerals, nearly every part of human activity has ceased. People want to do the right thing. But it’s very important that the government wherever and whenever possible issue, clear and direct guidance, so that normal people that live in this state can do the right thing and follow the rules.
He’s not going to weigh in on reports the federal government warned to go into lockdown earlier. He said state and federal politics should be put to one side.
Updated
WA has reported no new cases.
This is our WA COVID-19 weekend update for 15 August 2021.
— Mark McGowan (@MarkMcGowanMP) August 15, 2021
For official information on COVID-19 in WA, visit https://t.co/BxpzVwdsqthttps://t.co/K9wTEmQbNJ pic.twitter.com/ioyErp5FNh
Some photos of police patrolling Bondi beach today.
Updated
City2Surf event cancelled due to NSW Covid outbreak
It shouldn’t be too surprising but Sydney’s annual City2Surf has been cancelled this year.
AAP reports the event was to mark its 50th edition in 2021 but on Sunday organisers said it was impossible to go ahead.
“In light of the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic and the current NSW government restrictions on mass gatherings, it’s not possible for us to hold a physical event as we had hoped,” race director Marty Mashford said in a statement.
Entrants are instead encouraged to “run, dance, skip or walk” the 14km in their own neighbourhood.
“We’re heartbroken by this reality but, as always, the health and welfare of our community, its people and our team are our primary concern.”
The 2021 event had already been delayed from its usual August schedule to 17 October, sparking a need for additional hydration provisions due to higher temperatures later in the year.
It’s the second year that the City2Surf has gone “virtual” amid the coronavirus pandemic.
NSW on Sunday remained in lockdown, which is due to last until at least the end of August.
Updated
Covid-19 disaster payments extended to all of NSW
The federal government will extend its Covid-19 disaster payments to the rest of NSW now the whole state is in lockdown.
That means people will receive $750 per week if they’ve lost 20 hours or more, or $450 per week if they have lost between eight and 20 hours of work, or a full day or work.
People on income support payments can also get an extra $200 payment if they have lost at least eight hours of work.
Centrelink debt raising and new debt recovery will also be paused across the state.
The federal government has paid out $2.1bn in Covid-19 disaster payments so far, with claims exceeding $2.4bn.
On that note, I shall hand you back to Josh Taylor – take care of you.
Updated
A reader has just alerted us to this story from Polish media, reported this month, where Poland announced it was seeking to sell up to four million doses from its vaccine stockpile, including to Australia:
Michał Kuczmierowski, head of the Government Strategic Reserves Agency (RARS), which is expected to oversee the resale operation, said that Poland had ordered a total of about 100 million doses from various producers and that deliveries were expected to continue until the end of the first quarter of 2022.
...Under contracts signed with the European Commission, Poland has at least 4 million doses available for resale outside the country.
“However, we plan to sell many more vaccines … even tens of millions of doses,” Kuczmierowski said.
Here is what Scott Morrison had to say about the extractions from Afghanistan at this morning’s press conference:
I don’t think it is advisable for me to go into operational arrangements that are being put in place for the security of those we are seeking to help. Many openly discussing those arrangements wouldn’t help them and so I don’t propose to do that but I can assure you that this task has the utmost urgency and priority of the government and has been considered at the highest levels of government yesterday and we are in very constant engagement with our allies and partners as part of a broader effort.
Updated
Labor’s Penny Wong, Kristina Keneally and Brendan O’Connor have responded to the situation in Afghanistan.
Here is their whole statement, given the Taliban is continuing to march closer to Kabul and Australia still needs to extract people:
There is still no clarity on if, when and how the Morrison-Joyce government will get hundreds of Afghans who helped Australia, and their families, to safety.
Other countries have been evacuating their Afghan supporters for weeks.
Veterans, former prime ministers and Labor have long been calling for urgent action from the Morrison-Joyce government to fulfil Australia’s moral obligation to the Afghans who have risked everything to support our mission.
Distressingly, the Morrison-Joyce government appears incapable of acting fast on anything.
It is also now critical that the Morrison-Joyce government outline their plan to get partners and family of Australian citizens and permanent residents to safety.
There have been countless reports of Afghans seeking help being overwhelmed by paperwork and process, while their safety becomes increasingly precarious.
While every case must be considered on its individual merits – including security considerations – the Morrison-Joyce government’s bureaucratic delays clearly pale in comparison to what other countries are doing.
The deteriorating security situation underlines how the Morrison-Joyce government’s dithering is risking our friends’ lives.
Labor is deeply concerned for the security of Kabul following the Taliban’s rapid takeover of regional capitals, including Kandahar.
The unfolding security and humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan is devastating for the people of Afghanistan, for Australian-Afghans fearful for their loved ones’ safety, for the Afghan staff that supported our military and diplomatic operations for over 20 years – and for our veterans.
There is bipartisan agreement on the withdrawal of ADF troops from Afghanistan.
However, given our 20-year military commitment to Afghanistan’s security and development – particularly for women and girls – we urge the Morrison-Joyce government to explain what solutions are being considered by the international community to support Kabul’s security and respond to the growing humanitarian crisis.
Labor will be seeking further briefings on this issue next week.
You can follow the unfolding situation in Afghanistan in our liveblog here:
Updated
It really seems surreal that it is 18 months into a worldwide pandemic and this is only just happening – but rapid covid tests are now going to be rolled out for Australia’s aged care centres.
From Greg Hunt’s office:
The Australian government is providing Covid-19 rapid antigen testing (RAT) to residential aged care facilities in greater Sydney, to further protect aged care residents, workers and their families.
The program will begin on Monday, 16 August at the Uniting Bankstown Aged Care Facility, and then progressively roll out to other facilities who expressed their interest in participating.
Respond Global has been selected to lead the program, providing the residential aged care facilities with training and protocols in using the tests and recording the RAT results.
Roche will supply the initial RAT, after being selected through a competitive tender process. It is anticipated that as the program expands, three more RAT suppliers will also supply their tests for use.
Updated
The official announcement on the additional Pfizer vaccines from Poland has just dropped as a press release. Here is part of it:
The additional doses are on top of the 40 million Pfizer doses that Australia has already secured for 2021, and will provide a boost to the vaccine roll-out across the country.
The one million doses will be targeted to Australians aged 20 to 39 years of age, who were identified in the Doherty Modelling as the peak transmitters of COVID-19.
530,010 doses will be prioritised for express delivery to the 12 Greater Sydney Local Government Areas where the COVID-19 outbreak continues to grow, following advice from the Chief Medical Officer Professor Paul Kelly.
This will give everyone aged 20 to 39 years in the 12 LGAs the opportunity to be vaccinated.
The remaining 470,340 Pfizer doses will be distributed on a per capita basis to other states and territories, to fast-track the vaccination of 20 to 39 year olds and other high risk groups.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison said the new Pfizer doses would start being administered in State Clinics across Greater Sydney this week.
“There are a million doses of hope on their way,” the Prime Minister said.
“Within days of landing in Australia, these extra Pfizer doses will be available to go into the arms of young Australians in our hardest hit COVID hot-spots.
“These young Australians are often the backbone of our essential workforce and these doses will not only protect them, but their loved ones, their state and our nation.
“We can get on top of this by working together to suppress and vaccinate.
“I want to personally thank Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki and his government for their generous support of Australia’s Covid-19 response, during this challenging time
Updated
NRL confirms season to continue in Queensland
I am still a believer in NRL Island (never forget) but the games will continue in Queensland, AAP reports:
The NRL has confirmed the competition will remain in Queensland for the remainder of the regular season, with infection rates in NSW making it “impossible” to return to the state.
Rugby league heartlands Rockhampton, Toowoomba and Mackay will host games in the final three rounds.
Rockhampton was set to host its first NRL game on July 31 - the round 20 fixture between St George Illawarra and South Sydney - but the game ws postponed just hours before kick-off due to a snap Covid-19 lockdown in Queensland’s south-east.
Browne Park will now be the venue for the round 23 clash between Wests Tigers and Cronulla on Saturday, and the Dragons’ meeting with North Queensland on August 28.
There will be double-headers played at Suncorp Stadium in rounds 23 and 24, Moreton Daily Stadium in round 24 and at Cbus Stadium in round 25.
NRL boss Andrew Abdo said one positive to come from the scheduling issues due to coronavirus was taking the game to new regions.
“The pandemic is creating many challenges, but it is also creating opportunities,” Abdo said.
“We’re really excited to be taking games to Rockhampton, Mackay and Toowoomba in the final three weeks of the regular season.’”
“The rising infection rate in NSW has made it impossible to return to NSW.”
The NRL has yet to confirm where the grand final will be played, with Brisbane’s Suncorp Stadium the most likely venue.
Updated
A very big thank you to Josh Taylor who, after that morning, has absolutely earned his break.
You have Amy Remeikis with you to take you through the next little bit of the day.
With the daily press conferences done and dusted, I will hand over to live blogging extraordinaire Amy Remeikis while I go have a break.
Mark McGowan wants NSW to crush virus
Here’s a bit more on what Western Australia premier Mark McGowan told Sky News this morning, from AAP:
McGowan is urging the NSW government to take an even tougher stance on eradicating the coronavirus for the sake of the country.
McGowan said NSW needs to adopt the approach to “crush and kill” the virus that was taken by his state, in South Australia, and as Victoria and Queensland are still doing.
“We just want them to get it under control for the sake of the people in NSW and also for the sake of the rest of the country,” McGowan told Sky News’ Sunday Agenda program.
“NSW delayed putting in measures that worked, they obviously believed all that stuff written about them being the ‘gold standard’ and all that sort of stuff, which was clearly a mistake.”
Updated
Victorian Covid commander, Jeroen Weimar, says there are now over 500 exposure sites in Victoria and 13,000 primary close contacts who are isolating.
He has provided a breakdown of the 25 cases today:
- 10 are household contacts from Al-Taqwa College.
- Seven are associated with the Glenroy West primary school cluster.
- Three associated with the Caroline Springs Shopping Centre. Three household members, with two associated with the Jolly Miller Cafe and one with the YPA Estate Agency.
- Five mystery cases. One is a social contact of the Middle Park case, which has been linked but the source of the Middle Park case has not been identified.
- The second mystery case today is a cleaner who lives in the city of greater Dandenong, a commercial cleaner who has worked on Fitzroy Street, who may also be linked to the Middle Park case.
- There is also a construction worker who lives in West Footscray with no linkages, and two cases in St Kilda East.
Updated
There still hasn’t been a link between the first ACT case and the Sydney outbreak. The Gold Creek student case has also not been linked to the current outbreak in the ACT yet.
Here’s the full breakdown of the extra Pfizer going across Australia, outside of the 530,000 going to the NSW outbreak areas:
- Victoria: 175,500
- Queensland: 136,890
- South Australia: 47,970
- Western Australia: 70,200
- Tasmania: 17,550
- Northern Territory: 8,190
- ACT: 14,040
It’s on a per capita basis.
Updated
On that note, ACT chief minister, Andrew Barr, has said the ACT will get 14,000 extra doses of Pfizer as part of the Polish agreement announced this morning.
He notes that the ACT was only told about the extra vaccine just before the PM held the press conference this morning.
He said it’s about a week’s worth of doses for the capital:
It will allow us to do more but it isn’t such a dramatic increase in supply that will allow us to do radically more. We are working on what this will mean and will have some further information for the community in the coming days. We only found out about this a few minutes before the rest of the nation so we will need a little bit of time to work through that and will provide an update to the community on what these extra doses will allow in the coming days.
Updated
Victoria to get 175,000 more doses of Pfizer
Daniel Andrews appears to have accepted the federal government’s decision to send half of the additional 1m Pfizer doses to New South Wales.
In part, that’s because “there’s no way they are going to get to zero cases”, he says of NSW.
Andrews says:
I know some Victorians will ask why are they getting more than we are? Nothing else they (New South Wales) are doing is working, nothing else has worked. They’ve got to vaccinate their way out of this now. We don’t want to get to that point because the flip side to that is hundreds of people in hospital, and people dying, we don’t want that, we’ve got a chance to do what we’ve done before, and drive these case numbers down.
Andrews appears to say Victoria will get 175,000 of those doses.
The prime minister has made his decision. The fact of the matter is, the greatest need is in Sydney. I voiced support of those who are in the greatest need getting the greatest support. Could we have a long debate about why Sydney in the position it is in? I am not going to do that. I’m not going to offer up that sort of commentary. We had plenty of people giving us the benefit of their wisdom, so called, last year, and Victorians were thoroughly sick of it by the end of last year, so I’m not going to contribute to it. All I will say is they have to be given more vaccine in New South Wales because nothing else they are doing is working, this is where they are at now.
Asked if he thinks Victoria would have gotten the same deal as NSW if it was in the same situation, he says he would “like to think so”.
But he claims there were a lot of “political attacks” and people “laughing at Victoria” last year.
Updated
Barr says the statewide lockdown in NSW is welcome, but will have implications for Canberra. He says people near the ACT border can travel into Canberra for a small number of essential reasons, but people should stay home as much as possible:
We are aware of the challenges the cross-border situation presents and we’re working with our New South Wales counterparts to make it as straightforward as possible. The simple message: unless you absolutely have to travel, unless you absolutely need to leave home, don’t right at the moment.
Updated
One ACT case unlinked
And now we turn to the ACT chief minister, Andrew Barr, for the capital’s daily update.
He says the first of the two new cases is a man in his 20s, which is currently unlinked to other cases. The second case is linked to the Fiction nightclub. He says anyone who was there at the time should get tested and isolate.
There were 5,943 tests in the ACT on that day, which Barr says is a record for Canberra.
Updated
Back to NSW, premier Gladys Berejiklian has clearly stated lockdown won’t end if case numbers are still high:
Can I be very specific about this? We need to keep case numbers as low as possible. We cannot live freely, right, just because you can do one additional thing doesn’t mean living freely. Living freely will not be upon us until we have lower case numbers and until we have 70%, 80% double doses. I cannot stress that enough. It is a combination of things that we need.
There is no way that I will take any decision is a premier of the state which is going to cause unnecessary death and heartache for the people of this state, and on that basis, all of us need to work together to get those case numbers down and get vaccination rates up.
I have confidence in the people of this state to achieve both. People have come out in droves to get their vaccine and communities respond in ways they never have but we need everybody to do the right thing and everybody to respect the rules we have and everyone to appreciate the importance of getting their vaccine to save lives (and to keep) people out of hospital.
And that’s the end of the daily NSW press conference.
Updated
'Very challenging' to exit Victorian lockdown, Andrews says
Turning to Victoria for a moment, premier Daniel Andrews has warned Victoria continues to record mystery cases that will make it “very challenging” for the state to open up right now.
The current lockdown in greater Melbourne is slated to lift on Thursday, but there were 25 cases recorded today, including four which have not yet been linked.
The Victorian premier said:
There are a number of mystery cases, and those numbers continue to grow. And that is very challenging.
If we were to reopen the whole economy, if we were to reopen and let people move freely right now, then we would finish up where Sydney is. Thousands of cases, not cases in the tens and 20s, but thousands of cases, and hundreds and hundreds of people in hospital, and many of them, very unwell. We would finish up with deaths.
Andrews criticised people who took part in what he described as a “pub crawl” in Richmond last night.
He said:
I know this is getting really hard, it is getting really frustrating, it is getting really difficult.
Updated
The NSW premier indicates any freedoms to come in September and October will likely be focused on people who are vaccinated:
We are looking for what opportunities we can provide our citizens in September and October. As I’ve said, we can’t expect to live life freely (like) before the outbreak until we at least hit 70% both doses. I have been very clear about that, at 80% two doses.
However, if we get those 6 million targets, there are opportunities for us to consider what is safe to do in September and October that we can’t do today. And I will make this point. A lot of the lockdown provisions in New South Wales are harsher than what we had in other parts of Australia.
People currently, there is a number of things people can’t do now, but if there is a safe way to do that, if people are vaccinated, we will consider those options, and that is what we have asked Dr Chant to give us advice on, and that is dependent on us getting those high rates of vaccinations, it also having confidence that this thing isn’t going to take off.
She said case numbers will need to get down, too:
But many, as well as members of the team, are very keen to see us provide additional things you can do in September and October in a safe way, if you are vaccinated. If you are vaccinated, there are opportunities we are exploring currently, but of course that is also contingent on us making sure that this doesn’t take off. Now, that is why it is important for us to make sure in the next few days that we don’t see the trend going the wrong way, but we continue to see a trend where case numbers are declining, not going up.
Updated
Berejiklian is asked whether the goal of Covid zero is gone now.
She says eliminating Delta is “near impossible”:
I think what we need to focus on is what Dr Chant and myself have been saying right from the beginning of the outbreaks, is we want to be in a position where we get down to case numbers as low as possible, and, we want to see the rate of people infectious in the community going down as much as possible, and that has been our position right from the outset, and I can’t stress that enough.
... But our aim is to have case numbers as low as possible and to have vaccination rates as high as possible, and with adults, the experience of Delta is that no other jurisdiction has been able to eliminate it.
It’s not possible to eliminate it completely. We have to learn to live with it. But the best chance we have to live with it freely and safely is to get the case numbers down as low as possible.
She said the dual strategy of the lockdown and vaccination will get numbers down to allow NSW to live freely in the future, but people need to accept that “eliminating Delta is something that is near impossible”.
Updated
Chant is asked about whether it was overreach for a family to be put into special health accomodation after testing positive for Covid-19.
Chant indicates public health clinicians have “section 62 order” powers to put people who are not cooperating and would present a risk to transmit Covid-19 into alternative accomodation.
She said the power is used when there are concerns about compliance risk, or in situations like people living in apartments where it makes sense to move them somewhere else.
Berejiklian was asked whether some restrictions would be eased in September and October has she has previously suggested given case numbers are still so high. The premier doesn’t directly answer the question, but says the 466 cases yesterday were a wake-up call:
Yesterday was an absolute wake-up call and as Dr Chant has said, we can’t stress enough that we don’t want to go down the path of all these other places overseas where they have literally thousands and thousands and thousands of cases a day. That is what Delta is doing to communities that have much higher vaccination rates than we do. So it is our opportunity to have a forward path for Australia which is different to what is occurring everywhere else. That is why we are really bugging people to take this seriously, to please know to protect yourself and your loved ones and protect our freedom forward, if you want freedom moving forward, just do the right thing, stay at home.
Stay home, get vaccinated. That is it. Can I say to everybody in New South Wales, the future is in our hands. Together we can do this ... The future is in our hands. We have a choice to do the right thing.
We have a choice to follow the rules and get our vaccine and a combination of following the rules and getting vaccinated will help us get to where we want to be ... but the risk is that if too many people do the wrong thing, New South Wales and Australia will follow is what has happened overseas with thousands and thousands of cases every day. And so many deaths. We don’t want to see that happen. We want people to be safe and avoid hospitalisation and that is why we are asking everybody to do what is asked of them. We know it is hard but we are literally all in this together. It is the combined efforts of our community, business and our health and police that we can achieve what we need to achieve.
Updated
NSW premier, Gladys Berejiklian, says it is an “absolute fact” that the advice to lockdown the whole state from Chant came after the press conference yesterday.
She didn’t directly answer whether the federal government had offered similar advice earlier.
The premier defended the decision not to hold another press conference to announce it yesterday, instead advising by tweet:
To be frank, by yesterday most of the state was locked down already. It was just a few local government areas in regional and rural communities. Please note that in a pandemic, you have to act on the health advice you receive and we had received advice yesterday about many people moving from the ACT to the southern parts of New South Wales which was a concern given what is happening in the ACT so that advice was provided to me yesterday and we took that advice immediately.
Updated
There is still a lot of workplace transmission happening in NSW, and that will be a focus. Chant says parents are being asked to keep children home from childcare where possible.
She said they need to break chains of transmission, but part of the issue is many of those workplace transmissions are happening in essential workplaces like aged care, freight, and disability services.
When asked whether NSW should have implemented some of the restrictions announced yesterday before yesterday, Chant said people should focus on the future:
I provided advice about the need for a statewide lockdown from the briefing yesterday and it is clearly needed because of the emerging case numbers in the regions. What is most important at the moment is the community to focus on the challenges ahead of us. We have a choice at the moment.
The choice I’m urging the community to do is stay with the health orders, redouble your efforts, do not take risks, protect your loved ones and just hold with us with an intensity over the upcoming two to three weeks while we work with police to get case numbers down.
Some initiative yesterday I’m incredibly pleased about in terms of isolation payments so there should be no reason why anyone, even second guesses having a test because there is a payment that can be provided to people in those local, affected areas, to isolate stop areas support.
There are a range of initiatives that have been put in place and I’m pleased that they are in place. Please see the numbers go down.
Updated
Chant is asked, if everyone complies with the current rules, whether the case numbers will finally come down in NSW, and how long it will take.
Chant says she understands the frustration, and an increased focus on compliance by NSW police will help. She says NSW is at a “fork in the road” when it comes to the outbreak:
The path I want is one where I see declining case numbers and increasing vaccination uptake. The vaccine will take, it will not be a silver bullet. We would not expect any significant effect and it is really important because just because you are vaccinated, it doesn’t mean that you can immediately, that you are immediately productive.
You need about two weeks, two to three weeks following vaccination to have any effect. But vaccination is part of the solution. It helps us because if the person is vaccinated, there is less chance that they get the disease particularly if they have had two doses. And therefore, it means they are less likely to pass it to others. And also less likely to need hospital care and admission to intensive care.
Updated
NSW deputy police commissioner, Mick Willing, says 529 infringement notices were issued overnight, and 29 people were charged.
There were 31 notices issued to young people gathering at the cliffs at Clovelly, and 18 to people at a gathering in Jesmond near Newcastle.
Ten were issued to a group of people who went to a barbecue lunch at Blacktown:
I would love to go to a barbecue lunch with my friends and family, but now is simply not the time. We are faced with a situation with the Delta variant that spreads across young people, so it is particularly disappointing to see young people involved in breaches of the public health order. We now have a statewide lockdown across the state, and we need 100% of people to stay at home and comply with the orders. Not 90%. 100%.
NSW deputy premier John Barilaro has now addressed the statewide lockdown announced late yesterday. He confirms it is a seven-day lockdown at first, and notes 21 of the new cases today were in western NSW, with nine infectious in the community:
This will allow us to work through the details, through the data, as we have heard from Dr Chant, especially for sewage surveillance, to make sure that we stay ahead of the curve. We know, and we have seen already with what we did in Orange, a sharp and hard lockdown early has meant that we have seen freedom come back to regional New South Wales even sooner.
Western New South Wales continues to be of concern, especially Dubbo and Walgett. 21 cases overnight and nine still in the community, and that is of concern.
In Hunter New England we are seeing stabilisation, but still nine cases ... we are focused on Maitland. The Central Coast, two cases, one in the community, so again, of concern. Exposure sites that we are concerned about through sewage surveillance, Wilcannia, Bourke, Parkes, Mudgee and Lennox Head, they remain a concern, because through surveillance previously we have been able to identify those cases.
Updated
Vaccine 'no silver bullet', Chant says
The NSW chief health officer, Dr Kerry Chant, has said in the clearest possible terms that vaccination rates alone will not get NSW out of the current outbreak:
There is no silver bullet and vaccination is not a silver bullet. It is a tool. And vaccination alone will not get us out of this situation. We need to follow the public health orders, and my message to everyone is, let’s redouble our efforts for the next couple of weeks. Get those case numbers down. Stay at home.
Updated
Some more data from the NSW Health tweet:
- 381 Covid-19 cases admitted to hospital, with 62 people in intensive care, 24 of whom require ventilation.
- Of the 415 locally acquired cases reported to 8pm last night, 167 are from Western Sydney Local Health District (LHD), 98 are from South Western Sydney LHD, 42 are from Sydney LHD, 36 are from Nepean Blue Mountains LHD, 31 are from South Eastern Sydney LHD, 21 are from Western NSW LHD, nine are from Hunter New England LHD, six are from Northern Sydney LHD, two are from Central Coast LHD and the addresses of three cases are to be verified.
- Seventy-six cases were in isolation throughout their infectious period and 24 were in isolation for part of their infectious period. Forty-two cases were infectious in the community, and the isolation status of 273 remains under investigation.
Updated
Berejiklian says the areas of most concern are in western and south western Sydney, particularly Blacktown, Merrylands, Mount Druitt, Auburn, and Guilford.
Updated
NSW hits 5m jabs
Berejiklian says 50% of the NSW population has had a first dose of the vaccine, and 5m jabs have been administered.
She says the state is on target for its vaccine milestones. She has also welcomed the federal announcement of 1m more Pfizer doses, with 530,000 going to the 12 LGAs of concern.
NSW records 415 new cases and four more deaths
NSW premier Gladys Berejiklian has announced 415 new cases of Covid-19, and four more deaths:
We had 415 cases of community transmission, so a welcome drop from (yesterday) but obviously much more work to be done. We just ask everybody to please stick to the rules, stay home, get tested if you have symptoms, stay home again until you get the results, and of course come forward and get vaccinated.
Of those 415 cases of community transmission, at least 35 were infectious in the community, and that number is likely to go up as the cases under investigation are consolidated.
Regrettably, four people lost their lives to 8pm last night, a female in her 50s in south-western Sydney at Campbelltown Hospital, she wasn’t vaccinated, a female in her 70s at Royal North Shore Hospital who was only recently given her first dose, so wasn’t protected, a man in his 80s at Liverpool Hospital who wasn’t vaccinated, a female in her 80s at RPA who was vaccinated but did have underlying chronic conditions. Again, our heartfelt deepest sympathies and condolences to all of their loved ones.
Updated
ACT reports two new cases
The ACT has reported two new cases, taking this cluster to nine cases.
ACT COVID-19 update (15 August 2021)
— ACT Health (@ACTHealth) August 15, 2021
▪️ Cases today (since yesterday’s press conference): 2
▪️ Active cases: 9
▪️ Total cases (since March 2020): 133
▪️ Negative test results (past 24 hours): 3,292
▪️ Total negative tests: 291,342
▪️ Total COVID-19 vaccinations: 169,545 pic.twitter.com/tH7Rz1glkH
11.20am AEST for Victorian press conference. So yes, there will be a bit going on for the next hour or so.
Looks like the ACT press conference is at 11.45am AEST.
We don’t have a Vic presser time yet but there might be some juggling with the NSW press conference in 17 minutes.
In Queensland, the premier, Annastacia Palaszczuk, was also asked about the fact NSW’s lockdown was announced first on Twitter. Palaszczuk has said the announcement triggered discussions that led to an increased police presence on the border.
And as Josh wrote before, she started her press conference by noting pointedly the Queensland government had “heard the news on Twitter”.
Palaszczuk was asked about the way the news was announced:
That’s a matter for them but that’s not the way we communicate to the Queensland public. Look, I understand they had to act quickly, I think we just need to wait to see the reasoning today from the New South Wales premier [but] that’s entirely a matter for them. We have to act on the advice we’re given, we had to verify that advice, and we acted as quickly as we possibly could.
The Queensland police commissioner, Katarina Carroll, said every vehicle entering Queensland from NSW was now being intercepted by police.
She also said three Brisbane nightclubs were issued $6,800 fines for breaches of Covid directions.
The venues had been previously warned. Patrons were not wearing masks, standing while having their drinks and the venues had gone over capacity limits.
Updated
Not sure if he misspoke, but the health minister, Greg Hunt, said the NSW statewide lockdown is going for 14 days:
The strong, clear, unequivocal support for the hard 14 day statewide lockdown, is a difficult decision. It affects a lot of people. It is the right decision and that is then backed by the very significant injuries and vaccinations which were occurring but which will now be aided by these additional doses.
NSW premier Gladys Berejiklian tweeted yesterday it was seven days:
Following the press conference today, I received health advice concerning multiple regional NSW areas. As such, from 5pm tonight, all of regional NSW will go into a seven-day lockdown. This means the whole state is in strict lockdown. pic.twitter.com/urND0bYfkT
— Gladys Berejiklian (@GladysB) August 14, 2021
Updated
Morrison says there is no policy on vaccine passports. The government just provides a digital certificate for vaccination, and there are discussions with state and territory governments on what freedoms could be afforded to those who are vaccinated.
Morrison says the extra 1m doses of Pfizer from Poland is a “straightforward transaction” but won’t go into the commercial details.
It is interesting to note that the double dose vaccination rate in Poland is less than 50%.
#Poland hasn’t reached even 50% vaccination rate yet. Why are we taking their vaccines? How much are we paying? What do the Polish people think about this? https://t.co/stWRfXuz4g pic.twitter.com/iiu4gH3CUs
— PK (@paulkidd) August 15, 2021
Updated
Morrison was asked about whether the federal government had urged the NSW government to do a statewide lockdown earlier in the week. Morrison is careful not to criticise the NSW government, but indicated the federal chief medical officer, Paul Kelly, had advised to do a statewide lockdown:
I confirmed the decision of the New South Wales government to have a statewide lockdown, consistent with the advice that I had received from the chief medical officer that the government has considered and had been discussed with the NSW government.
He said he is pleased the decision has been taken and it is important to now focus on how it works. He won’t comment on the NSW government announcing it via Twitter and Facebook posts without a press conference.
He says it is a false dichotomy to say it should be either vaccines or lockdowns. He says the lockdown in NSW has to work.
Updated
Q: Has the Taliban won the war in Afghanistan?
Morrison:
My concern is for the people of Afghanistan and seeking to protect the lives of Afghans.
The world is a complex place and there is no place more complex than Afghanistan. Australia and our allies have done much to secure their peace but this remains a very troubled part of the world not just recently but over generations and generations. We went there with our primary purpose, as I’ve indicated, and that was to hunt down Osama bin Laden and prevent al-Qaeda using it as a base and mounting their attack. That was achieved but the challenge for the people of Afghanistan, sadly, remains an unresolved issue and we hope for the best for them but the situation is very dire.
Our focus now is to ensure that we continue to support those who have aided us and ensuring that 400 people have already been brought to Australia as we have been working on this quite rapidly in recent months as the situation continues to deteriorate. We will continue to redouble our effort in that regard with our partners.
Updated
Rapid antigen testing trial in Sydney aged care
The health minister, Greg Hunt, says rapid antigen testing will be trialled in 50 aged care facilities in Sydney.
He says the extra Pfizer going to Sydney will allow significant upscaling of the vaccination rollout, particularly among the young in those 12 LGAs of concern.
Head of the federal Covid taskforce, Lt Gen John Frewen, says the extra doses will also help accelerate the national rollout.
Foreign minister, Marise Payne, explains what Australia is doing for our region at the same time as we have secured more Pfizer from Poland:
“Australia will share 20m doses with our neighbouring countries across the Pacific and in Timor-Leste and south-east Asia. We have already delivered over 1.6m doses to the Pacific and Timor-Leste, including 860,000 to Fiji and 577,002 Timor, and to Papua New Guinea, to the Solomon Islands, Samoa, Tonga, Tuvalu and Vanuatu. We will also provide 2.5m vaccines to Indonesia, 1.5m to Vietnam, and in terms of Indonesia’s most recent challenges, we have most recently seen the delivery of 1000 ventilators and 700 oxygen concentrators in assistance to our partners in Indonesia in their Covid-19 response.
Updated
Morrison says the 1m Pfizer doses will begin to arrive in Australia tonight, and jabs will go into arms this week, particularly in NSW.
He also pleads with people in NSW to adhere to lockdown rules:
I have a simple plea to the people right across NSW, and I know particularly in rural areas, where people are wondering, well, there have not been any cases in our area, so why do they have to lockdown in rural and regional New South Wales?
We are seeing that already, where the virus has been able to spread, particularly to some of our most sensitive communities, Australian communities, places like Walgett and so on, and we have to prevent that. We have to try and prevent that as much as possible. And so my plea to my fellow Australians, particularly my fellow Sydneysiders, stay at home. Stay at home. Only leave when you absolutely have to. There is no need to be out for hours and hours and hours a day. I know the rules provide for it, but please, don’t do it. Stay home.
Updated
1m extra doses of Pfizer secured from Poland
The prime minister, Scott Morrison, has announced the government has secured an extra 1m doses of Pfizer, on top of the 40m already bought, in a deal with Poland.
Earlier today, a plane left Dubai, having left Warsaw last night. We have been in discussions with the Polish government now for several weeks, and we have secured an additional 1m doses of Pfizer and they will start landing in Australia tonight.
These doses are on top of the 40 million doses of Pfizer that Australia has already contracted to be delivered, and of course will be ramping up again significantly in the fourth quarter of this year. These 1m doses of hope, which will give people right across the country, particularly in New South Wales, where they are fighting this Delta strain in the most significant battle we have had in this country during the course of the Covid-19 pandemic up until now.
530,000 of the new 1m doses will be sent to the 12 LGAs of concern in NSW to vaccinate people aged between 20 and 39.
Updated
PM press conference begins
And now we switch to the prime minister, Scott Morrison, who is holding press conference.
He says vaccination rates in Australia are now 1.5m per week, and the country is on track to have one in every two eligible Australians having had at least one jab.
Extra police in Queensland-NSW border
Palaszczuk says extra police were deployed to the NSW border after a statewide lockdown was announced:
Can I say that when we heard the news on Twitter yesterday, we immediately got together all of our key state agencies and the heads to address what has been happening down at the border. We worked very hard yesterday, late afternoon into the evening, to get extra police presence down there. Now, because all of New South Wales is in a lockdown position, there should be very minimal movement over that border. And that extra police presence will ensure we do everything we can to keep Queenslanders safe. So this is probably the tightest border controls we have put in place, they are going to be very strict, we will be checking people, and of course there is very minimal reason for that movement and we will be checking freight as well.
Updated
Queensland reports zero new local cases
Queensland premier Annastacia Palaszczuk has said there were zero new local cases of Covid-19 reported in the state today. There was one case in hotel quarantine.
Well done Queensland. That is absolutely the perfect way to start a Sunday.... So that is great news, but that is not to say that we don’t expect some more cases coming out of that in Indooroopilly cluster.
Updated
So Insiders panellists are suggesting the PM’s press conference will be about Afghanistan, Covid payments, and vaccine supply. We will see momentarily.
New tax to put the brakes on electric cars
With Victoria introducing a road user charge for electric vehicles from July and South Australia slated to introduce a similar impost next year, a poll has found many potential buyers could be put off, AAP reports.
The Australia Institute quizzed about 600 people in SA and found that for almost 70% a user tax would make them less likely to purchase an electric vehicle.
The survey also revealed more than 40% had considered going electric with their next vehicle purchase and more than 70% believe them good for the planet.
Australia Institute SA Director Noah Shultz-Byard says it’s clear new user charges will “pull the handbrake” on consumer enthusiasm for electric cars.
“Our research shows that the vast majority want more EVs on the road, not less, because they are considered to be good for the climate, health and the environment,” he said.
Victoria’s new tax imposes a 2.5 cent charge for each kilometre travelled, putting the annual cost at $500 for a vehicle travelling 20,000 kilometres.
It narrowly passed the Victorian parliament despite an alliance of 25 car manufacturers and environmental groups writing to MPs urging them to vote against the plan.
The letter, signed by Hyundai, Volkswagen, Uber and the Electric Vehicles Council among others, described the tax as the “worst electric vehicle policy in the world”.
SA had also planned to introduce a road user charge this year but has put it off until July, partly to gauge the impact of the Victorian legislation.
Updated
A wild prime minister appears. Scott Morrison is joining the 10-12pm press conference run with a press conference at 10am AEST.
The daily Gladys Berejiklian press conference alert has also come through. 11am AEST as per usual.
Burke says a lot of the frustration in western Sydney is about how different they are being treated to Sydney’s eastern suburbs:
The initial messaging that came out of the government when it originally hit the media couldn’t have been worse because it was all about boots on the ground, as though it was there as some enforcement measure blaming the community, at the same time every weekend the community would see images of people seemingly doing whatever they wanted at Bondi beach.
So there was a frustration there. One of the great things that Brigadier Garraway has been making clear in the online meetings is that they are not there in an enforcement role. You wouldn’t know that from the way it was initially publicised and we have been trying to get that information out so that they are now working – we have members of the defence force working side by side with communities putting together food packages, and the people requiring food packages this time in the local area, it is quite different to what we were doing 12 months ago.
He says there would be “fury” in the western suburbs if restrictions are eased in the eastern suburbs first:
We are the home of essential workers. We don’t have that many people who can do their work at home from a laptop. We have to go out into a whole lot of different parts of Sydney to work, to do essential work, to stack shelves, to drive vehicles, to work on logistics, to work in aged care. People work multiple jobs, they are in large households, trying to home-school. In many instances there are more people than there are rooms in the home. The frustration of a double standard – yeah, there would be fury.
Updated
Burke is asked why case numbers in NSW, and his electorate in Canterbury-Bankstown are still going up. He says there is a lot of frustration over the delays in locking down, the rules, and poor communication:
People were confused, and increasingly people are fed up and angry. You increasingly hear the frustration that, for the restrictions, the sickness and the deaths that are starting to come through in the community, it would not have happened if they had locked down Bondi, and there is a huge frustration about that. We also know it would not have happened if we had a proper quarantine system, it would not have happen we had a proper vaccine rollout in the country. So you’ve got that frustration underlying it.
We’ve also had terribly poor communication that has happened to people with rules changing and health advice not being provided in language. So what the community has done is they have just taken it over themselves. A whole lot of Arabic speaking doctors have just put out their own communication in English and in Arabic.
Updated
The shadow industrial relations minister, Tony Burke, is on ABC’s Insiders program and is asked about whether businesses should be requiring people to be vaccinated.
Burke says it should be a health expert decision:
It needs to be a health decision. Where those health orders are put in place, then we support them, but we don’t want a situation where these rules are different from one workplace to the other, not based on a health reason but based on where an employer goes. You end up with a whole lot of arguments permeating throughout the community where we want a simple message encouraging people to get vaccinated. Wherever there is a health order to that effect, support it absolutely.
Updated
There has been an interesting change to the NSW public health order. For those who are in those declared LGA hotspot areas under tighter lockdown restrictions than the rest of NSW, “outdoor recreation” has been removed as part of the exercise allowance, and instead replaced with “to supervise a child aged 12 years or under who is undertaking exercise or at play”.
The existing outdoor recreation allowance applies for the rest of the state.
Zero Covid 'preferred option' in WA even after 80% vaccination
WA premier Mark McGowan has told Sky News that zero Covid is WA’s “preferred option” and indicated lockdowns and restrictions could still be in place in the state even once vaccination rates reach 80%:
Our preferred option is zero Covid obviously and that’s what we’ll attempt to do ... We don’t want to have deaths and we don’t want to have spread of the virus, but there can be some easing of some of the rules. When you get to 70, perhaps 80, if there is a lockdown it might be a lesser area rather than the entire metropolitan area. It might be a country town rather than the entire region.
We retain the right to put in place border [restrictions], that’s understood, but some of the measures we put in place might ease, once we reach that level of vaccination.
Updated
As part of the new statewide lockdown in NSW, a further 500 Australian Defence Force troops, in addition to the 300 already deployed, will assist with compliance checks and patrols in NSW while police ramp up operations across the state, AAP reports.
Police minister David Elliott says commissioner Mick Fuller requested the ADF reinforcements along with the boost to health orders.
“We’ve had to tighten the current public health orders because of the minority who exploited them,” he said in a statement on Saturday.
Defence personnel have also been assigned in Victoria to assist authorities with enforcement.
Updated
AAP reports a Sydney GP clinic that charged people hundreds of dollars to be vaccinated with Pfizer has been referred to the medical watchdog and will not be given any more Covid-19 vaccines.
Patients who were worried they would not be able to get a second dose will now be able to receive it at a nearby clinic next weekend.
Blessed Health Care came under the scrutiny of the federal health department after AAP revealed in late July it was charging up to $250 for a consultation before administering the Pfizer vaccine.
The clinic has two premises in Campsie in south west Sydney, one of the areas hardest hit by the current outbreak.
The clinic has been removed from the vaccine rollout program, following an investigation into the clinic’s non-compliance with the program.
It no longer appears on the official list of locations to get a Pfizer or AstraZeneca vaccine.
Doctors are not supposed to charge for the vaccine or the consults in which it is administered, even if a patient does not have Medicare.
The clinic has been ordered to immediately contact and refund all patients who paid for the vaccine.
Blessed Health Care began issuing refunds to patients last week, and did not respond to AAP’s requests for comment.
25 new cases in Victoria
Victoria has reported 25 new cases of Covid-19 overnight.
Just under half – 12 – were isolating while infectious, and four of the 25 have not yet been linked to the current outbreaks.
That’s four more cases than yesterday for those keeping track.
Reported yesterday: 25 new local cases and 0 new cases acquired overseas.
— VicGovDH (@VicGovDH) August 14, 2021
- 23,076 vaccine doses were administered
- 32,286 test results were received
More later: https://t.co/lIUrl1hf3W#COVID19Vic #COVID19VicData [1/2] pic.twitter.com/cPMA8FfJpq
Updated
Good morning and welcome to the Australian Covid-19 live blog for Sunday.
The entire state of New South Wales is in lockdown now, after reporting 466 new cases and four deaths on Saturday. The week-long lockdown of regional NSW to join with greater Sydney was announced on Saturday afternoon, via a tweet from premier Gladys Berejiklian and without a press conference.
No doubt that decision will be the focus of today’s press conference.
Berejiklian yesterday described the state’s fight against the Delta strain as “literally a war” and the situation dire until double dose vaccination rates in the state reach 70%.
From midnight Sunday, police have been given powers to issue $5,000 on-the-spot fines for anybody breaching self-isolation orders, with identical penalties for lying to obtain a travel permit, or lying to a contact tracer.
People can be fined $3,000 for exercising in groups larger than two or for breaching rules around trying to enter regional NSW.
People will also be restricted from travelling more than 5km from home for exercise and other permitted activities, down from 10km.
Victoria reported 21 cases of Covid-19 on Saturday, with 10 in the community while infectious. The latter number will need to go down to zero or close to zero if the state is to exit from lockdown on midnight Thursday as planned.
The Victorian case numbers should be up first this morning.
In the ACT, signs to come out of lockdown are more promising, with the capital recording just one new case yesterday, taking the cluster to seven cases.
In Queensland, the state recorded six new cases all linked and in isolation.
I’m Josh Taylor and I will be taking you through the next few hours and the run on press conferences we tend to have around 10am-12pm every day now.
