Unfolding coronavirus crisis in Fiji as authorities warn of ‘tsunami’ of cases

The world’s attention has been focused on India’s devastating COVID outbreak, but another crisis is unfolding on Australia’s doorstep.

The world’s attention has been focused on India’s COVID outbreak, but an unfolding crisis closer to home has authorities worried about a “tsunami” of cases right on Australia’s doorstep.

Fiji was able to avoid widespread transmission of COVID-19 for a year but this week its capital Suva and other cities were forced into lockdown after an outbreak that’s been linked to the Indian variant.

On Tuesday, six new cases emerged in quarantine facilities in Nadi, the city that is home to Fiji’s international airport.

Residents in Suva, Fiji, wear masks as they walk through the fish market. Picture: Leon Lord/ AFP

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The cluster began when a soldier contracted the virus at a quarantine facility and transmitted it to his wife, who then exposed up to 500 people at a funeral.

The permanent secretary for health and medical services, James Fong, said there was evidence soldiers who had returned from overseas deployments had broken quarantine rules by mixing with each other when they should have been in isolation.

“This is unacceptable,” he said, adding that the military was investigating what had happened.

Mr Fong said events in India showed the threat posed by the strain could not be underestimated.

“We cannot let that nightmare happen in Fiji,” he said in a televised address.

Security officers checking cars along a road in Suva after the Fijian capital entered a 14-day lockdown. Picture: Leon Lord/AFP

“We still have time to stop it happening but a single misstep will bring about the same COVID tsunami that our friends in India, Brazil, South Africa, the United Kingdom and the United States are enduring.”

Fiji has largely contained the virus through strict isolation measures and border controls, recording 109 cases and just two deaths in a population of 930,000.

There are currently 42 active cases, 18 of them detected at the border and 24 locally transmitted.

The capital Suva is in lockdown, along with Nadi and Lautoka, Fiji’s second largest city.

Authorities on Tuesday banned inter-island travel, while national carrier Fiji Airways has suspended all international and domestic passenger flights.

The emergence of community transmission is a blow for Fiji’s hopes of opening quarantine-free travel bubbles with Australia and New Zealand, both major sources of international tourists before the pandemic.

RELATED: Flights between India and Australia suspended

Security officers at a checkpoint in Suva. Picture: Leon Lord/AFP

Cars are checked in Suva. Picture: Leon Lord/AFP

— with AFP