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SYDNEY, Australia (AFP) — Millions of Sydney residents will spend another month in lockdown, authorities announced Wednesday, citing a still-growing coronavirus outbreak and low vaccination rates. Australia’s biggest city had been due to exit lockdown on July 30 after five weeks but the restrictions will remain in place until August 28 as case numbers continued to climb. “I appreciate personally what we’re asking people do for the next four weeks but it is because we […]
MELBOURNE, Australia (AFP) — Melbourne’s coronavirus lockdown will be lifted late Tuesday, as authorities signalled a Delta variant outbreak in Australia’s second-biggest city had been contained. Neighbouring South Australia state will also ease stay-at-home rules, but the country’s largest city Sydney was facing a likely extension to a lockdown now in its fifth week. After almost two weeks under stay-at-home orders, millions in Melbourne and surrounding Victoria state will exit their fifth lockdown just before […]
MELBOURNE, Australia (AFP) — Coronavirus lockdowns are likely to be lifted in two major Australian cities this week, authorities said Monday, as outbreaks of the Delta variant were brought under control. Around half of Australia’s 25 million largely unvaccinated residents are currently under stay-at-home orders. But while the largest city Sydney struggled to bring its outbreak to heel, the states of Victoria and South Australia reported progress. South Australia premier Steven Marshall said Monday that […]
by Andrew BEATTY Agence France Presse SYDNEY, Australia (AFP) — Sydney’s fast-growing coronavirus outbreak has become a “national emergency,” state leaders said Friday, as Australia’s largest city reported another record number of new infections. Admitting a month-long lockdown had so far failed to stop a Delta-variant outbreak, the state of New South Wales pleaded for Canberra to urgently send more vaccines and resources. Declaring the outbreak a national emergency could pave the way for […]
MELBOURNE, Australia (AFP) — Australia’s two largest cities are set to stay under tight Covid-19 restrictions as Melbourne on Monday extended a five-day snap lockdown designed to curb a virulent outbreak. “These restrictions simply cannot end at midnight tomorrow night,” Victoria state premier Daniel Andrews said, without saying how long the Melbourne lockdown would last. About 12 million people are under lockdown in Melbourne and Sydney, where a month of restrictions has failed to […]
by Andrew BEATTY SYDNEY, Australia (AFP) — Sydney’s five million residents will be in virus lockdown for at least another two weeks, state premier Gladys Berejiklian announced on Wednesday, rejecting calls to tighten restrictions further. Australia’s largest city is already in its third week of a partial lockdown and struggling to bring a fast-spreading outbreak of the coronavirus Delta variant under control. In the past 24 hours, 97 new cases were recorded, more than the […]
SYDNEY, Australia (AFP) — An Australian apartment block was placed under strict lockdown with police posted outside Tuesday, as authorities stepped up efforts to curb a fast-growing coronavirus outbreak. Police guarded both the front and rear exits of an apartment block in Sydney’s Bondi neighborhood, where nine people have tested positive for Covid-19, with movement in and out of the building restricted. A sign taped to one apartment window read “Send Beer” while another asked, […]
WELLINGTON, New Zealand (AFP) — New Zealand’s Jacinda Ardern on Monday announced a hastily convened virtual meeting of APEC leaders this week to discuss the Asia-Pacific region’s response to the Covid-19 pandemic and its economic impact. Ardern is scheduled to host the annual 21-nation Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit online in November, but called an additional ‘informal’ meeting for this Friday to examine immediate steps to address the crisis. “This is the first time in […]
SYDNEY, Australia (AFP) — Australia announced its first coronavirus-related death in the current Sydney virus outbreak on Sunday, as the country’s biggest city struggles to bring the Delta variant under control. The woman in her 90s died Saturday, hours after testing positive for Covid-19, and was also the first death from a locally-acquired infection in Australia this year. It came as authorities announced a record 77 new cases, and warned that numbers were expected to […]
SYDNEY, Australia (AFP) — Australia announced a dramatic cut in the number of people who will be allowed to enter the country Friday, as it struggles to contain coronavirus clusters that plunged major cities into lockdown. With almost half of the nation’s population under stay-at-home orders, Prime Minister Scott Morrison said quotas for overseas arrivals would be cut by around 50 percent to help prevent further outbreaks. Under the current “zero Covid” strategy, just 6,000 […]
by Holly ROBERTSON / with Tristan Lavalette in Perth Agence France Presse More than 10 million Australians have been ordered into lockdown as coronavirus cases spread across the country, and Brisbane on Tuesday became the fourth major city to issue stay-at-home orders. The three-day snap lockdown for Brisbane, starting on Tuesday evening, comes on top of similar measures imposed in Sydney, Perth and Darwin in recent days. “These are tough decisions,” Queensland state Premier […]
by Holly ROBERTSON BRISBANE, Australia (AFP) — Brisbane on Tuesday became the fourth major Australian city ordered into lockdown, as officials told residents to stay at home for three days over concerns about the rapid spread of Covid-19. About 10 million Australians will be in lockdown once the latest order comes into force from Tuesday evening. “These are tough decisions,” Queensland state Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk said. “We are having lockdowns in major cities because the […]
