10 days without local transmission, one new case in hotel quarantine

Victoria has marked 10 days without a case of local coronavirus transmission, prompting calls for international flights to resume.

Victorian opposition leader Michael O’Brien has called for Melbourne to resume taking international flights immediately.

Mr O’Brien said on Monday there was no reason to keep the flight ban in place, while about 10,000 Victorians remained stranded overseas.

There is speculation flights could resume next weekend, but acting premier James Merlino said he had no announcements to make when probed today.

Mr O’Brien said the flight ban, in place since last month’s circuit breaker lockdown, had gone on too long.

Overseas flights have been banned since a cluster broke out at the Holiday Inn at Melbourne Airport. Picture: Diego Fedele/Getty Images

“Daniel Andrews has so little confidence in his own hotel quarantine, in his own contact tracing that he said we’re just not accepting any flights,” he said.

“This cannot go on. It was only a few weeks ago Daniel Andrews was boasting about Victoria being the gold standard, was boasting about how other states were looking to Victoria to learn lessons about how we were doing it so well.

“Well if our hotel quarantine is so good, why have the planes stopped. If our hotel quarantine is gold standard, why don’t we have anybody else coming into it.

“The premier needs to fix his mess of hotel quarantine and get those flights restarted.”

Mr O’Brien said it was vital that stranded Victorians, international students and seasonal workers were given a route back to Victoria.

“The sooner that happens, the sooner the state might start to recover.”

Mr O’Brien joins leaders from other states and the federal government in pressuring the Premier to reopen the hotel quarantine program, and restart flights.

Premier Daniel Andrews has refused to say when they will resume. Picture: Darrian Traynor/Getty Images

Mr Andrews has refused to say when overseas arrivals would be allowed to fly directly back into Melbourne, declaring he was still waiting on health advice about the best path forward.

International flights have not landed in Melbourne since February 13, even though Victoria was supposed to be ­accepting 1310 arrivals a week, compared with NSW, which is taking up to 430 every day.

Victoria has now gone 10 days since the last case of local transmission was recorded.

But one new COVID case was recorded overnight.

The state’s active caseload is five, with nearly 10,000 people tested on Sunday.

It comes as Federal Health Minister Greg Hunt has slammed the suggestion from a Toorak doctor that patients should be charged for being injected with the coronavirus vaccine.

Speaking on Sunday, Mr Hunt said one medical practitioner in the prestigious Melbourne suburb had communicated his belief that the jab should come at a price, despite both the AstraZeneca and Pfizer doses being free of charge.

“I did have one Toorak doctor who talked to me about how much they wanted to charge patients,” Mr Hunt told reporters, according to The Australian.

“We said sorry – this is bulk billed. This is something that we have striven for. Worked for as a society. This is free.”

Meanwhile, Victorian small businesses say they are being told to lodge fraudulent documents in order to qualify for the state government’s latest round of support grants.

Amid criticism the criteria is too narrow, some businesses are refusing to apply after being advised of a workaround to qualify for support.