Coronavirus Australia live news: Cases spike in 6 Melbourne areas locked down a fortnight ago
New data reveals that six areas locked down a fortnight ago, as part of initial restrictions, are still seeing high rates of transmission.
- Locked down areas show transmission
- Hospitals grapple with spike
- 10 new cases for NSW
- Victoria hits record with 317 cases
- Young pubgoer highly infectious
Hello and welcome to The Australian’s rolling coverage of the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. New data shows spikes in 6 Victorian areas locked down a fortnight ago. The state’s hospitals are grappling with rising pateint numbers as the state reels from 317 new cases of coronavirus on Thursday, In NSW, while NIn NSW, there are 10 new cases. A man who visited the Crossroads Hotel had ‘one of the highest infection levels ever seen’, NSW Health Minister Brad Hazzard has revealed.
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AFP 8.35pm: Spain honours victims at state memorial
Badly hit by the pandemic and carefully watching the latest outbreaks, Spain paused on Thursday to honour its tens of thousands of victims at a state ceremony joined by top EU and World Health Organisation figures.
The memorial took place barely three weeks after Spain ended its months-long state of emergency, but coronavirus infections have grown since then, with health chiefs monitoring more 120 active outbreaks.
The virus has officially claimed 28,413 lives in Spain, making it the seventh-worst-hit country.
“Today, we are symbolically saying goodbye to mothers, fathers, children, siblings, friends: we take their hands, caress their cheek, kiss their forehead and remember their glance in our hearts,” Hernando Calleja, who lost his brother in April, said in an address at the ceremony.
Presided over by Spain’s King Felipe VI, the memorial took place in a square outside the Royal Palace in the presence of bereaved families and a host of top EU and WHO officials, with an orchestra playing Samuel Barber’s Adagio for Strings.
“This act cannot heal the pain felt by so many families at not being at the side of their loved ones in their final hours... but what it can do is pay tribute to their lives, to their contribution to our society, to their memories,” the king said.
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AFP 8pm: Germany prepares for tougher lockdowns
Germany plans to allow for tougher lockdown measures to contain local outbreaks and ward off the threat of a second coronavirus wave, according to a draft agreement between the federal and regional governments.
The new rules would include a ban on travel “in and out of the affected areas” to limit the spread of the virus, the document seen said.
The plan is set to be finalised later on Thursday.
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AFP 7.25pm: France to makes masks compulsory indoors
France will make the wearing of face masks compulsory in indoor public spaces from next week, the government said on Thursday, as officials noted signs of an uptick in the coronavirus outbreak.
Obligatory gear on collective transport until now, masks will also become mandatory in shops and other indoor places frequented by the public, Prime Minister Jean Castex said in the Senate.
Health Minister Olivier Veran earlier noted “weak signs of a resurgence” in the coronavirus epidemic that has claimed more than 30,000 lives in France.
“We are witnessing in certain hospitals in Paris weak signs of an epidemic resurgence, which is why I urge the French to remain particularly vigilant, active, against the virus,” he told public radio.
In the latest official data, released on Wednesday, France had seen 133 new coronavirus patients admitted to hospital in 24 hours, and 17 new admissions to intensive care.
This was down from a high of 4281 people hospitalised in one day in April. Mr Veran said an uptick in hospital admissions and telephone calls to emergency services were indicators, not yet worrying, that require “special attention” to the possibility of an epidemic upturn.
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Angelica Snowden 6.48pm: 700m wall constructed on NSW-Queensland border
Queensland police say they called for a 700m wall to be erected on the NSW-Queensland border to stop the illegal passage of people between the two states.
The “robust barricading” was being constructed around Dixon and Florence Street in Coolangatta on the Gold Coast on Thursday to prevent people from NSW going into Queensland unlawfully.
QLD border restrictions: Liverpool and Campbelltown in New South Wales have been declared COVID-19 hotspots. Anyone who has been there in the past 14 days won't be allowed into Queensland. https://t.co/jTIm4pbMqn pic.twitter.com/NK6D7JYIGK
— Queensland Police (@QldPolice) July 14, 2020
Gold Coast police chief superintendent Mark Wheeler said the wall was “their commitment to keeping COVID out of Queensland”.
“People were encroaching across the fencing that was there,” he said.
“They were coming into Queensland technically unlawfully so we strengthened that up.
“We saw a similar situation a couple of months ago in Miles Street.”
He said he understood that people were “frustrated” but it was not illegal to try and skirt the border checkpoints.
He said the wall was taking “considerable resources and time and effort” and is being constructed by the Gold Coast City Council.
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Kieran Gair 6pm: Key Sydney testing centres set to close down
The NSW government’s strategy to sustain “high rates” of COVID-19 testing in hotspots across southwestern Sydney could be undermined by a controversial move to prematurely close six pop-up clinics at the weekend.
The revelation comes after NSW recorded three mystery cases of COVID-19 in western and southwestern Sydney on Thursday, while the Crossroads Hotel outbreak grew to 40 cases.
Chief Health Officer Kerry Chant conceded contact tracers may have “missed a chain” after virus detectives were unable to connect three cases of “unknown origin” to the state’s reported total of 15 cases on Thursday.
“This is a critical time as we try to mop up any community transmission,” Dr Chant said. “The key message [is] we need to sustain high rates of testing in southwestern Sydney.”
The South Western Sydney Local Health District, however, is scheduled to close six pop-up and drive-through COVID-19 clinics over the weekend, according to the district’s website.
The decision to slash testing sites from about 12 to six comes despite a dire warning from Dr Chant that NSW is in a “critical” stage of contagion defined by growing community transmission in southwestern Sydney.
Testing will no longer be offered at the Crossroads Hotel in Casula and Victoria Park in Picton from Saturday, while the Leumeah drive-through clinic and the Narellan walk-in clinic are both set to close at 6pm on Friday.
Health officials are also expected to shut walk-in clinics at Camden Hospital and Moss Vale Showground on Sunday.
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Rachel Baxendale 5.30pm: Almost half of new Vic cases from 6 areas
Almost 40 per cent of Victoria’s net increase in active coronavirus cases on Thursday was in the six local government areas with postcodes which went to a Stage Three lockdown a fortnight ago, as part of the Andrews government’s targeting of 10 hotspot postcodes.
Victoria had 317 new cases on Thursday, but the net increase was 197, due to some previous cases recovering and others being reclassified due to duplication.
Of those, 78 were in the local government areas of Hume, Brimbank, Moonee Valley, Maribyrnong, the City of Melbourne and Moreland, all of which include postcodes which were part of the initial lockdown.
While it is difficult to measure the extent of any effect the lockdown may have had, the fact that we are seeing a net increase of 78 cases across these areas in a single day, a fortnight after they went to a stage three lockdown, indicates transmission has been continuing despite the restrictions.
There are also now 40 active cases in regional areas outside the Melbourne metropolitan and Mitchell Shire lockdown zone, including new cases on Thursday in Golden Plains, Horsham, South Gippsland, Ballarat and Northern Grampians.
This is an increase of 28 cases in regional areas since this time last week, when the whole of Melbourne lockdown began.
Active confirmed cases of COVID-19 by LGA as of Thursday, with net increase since Wednesday in brackets:
Wyndham (outer southwest): 265 (+16)
#Hume (outer north): 251 (+16)
#City of Melbourne: 225 (+16)
#Moonee Valley (northwest): 219 (+10)
#Brimbank (outer west): 180 (+24)
#Moreland (north): 118 (+7)
Whittlesea (outer north): 83 (+12)
Melton (outer northwest): 82 (+13)
Banyule (northeast): 63 (+12)
#Maribyrnong (inner west): 64 (+5)
Darebin (north): 66 (+10)
Yarra (inner northeast): 65 (+8)
Hobsons Bay (inner southwest): 47 (+8)
Whitehorse (east): 35 (+1)
Casey (outer southeast): 35 (+1)
Manningham (east): 30 (+4)
Boroondara (east): 26 (+3)
Monash (southeast): 26 (+3)
Stonnington (inner southeast): 25 (+4)
Port Phillip (inner south): 18 (-2)
Mitchell (central regional Vic, north of Melb): 15 (+1)
Nillumbik (outer northeast): 13 (+3)
Kingston (southeast): 11 (+4)
Glen Eira (east): 11 (+2)
Greater Dandenong: (outer southeast): 10 (-1)
Cardinia (outer southeast): 10 (-1)
Maroondah (outer east): 9 (+1)
Mornington Peninsula (inner regional, southeast): 7 (+2)
*Greater Geelong (southwest regional Vic): 7
Knox (outer east): 6 (+1)
Frankston (outer southeast): 5 (+2)
Bayside (southeast): 5 (+1)
Yarra Ranges (outer east) 5
*Golden Plains (western regional Vic): 4 (+1)
*Horsham (western regional Vic): 3 (+1)
*South Gippsland (eastern regional Vic): 3 (+1)
*Macedon Ranges (central regional Vic): 3
*Bass Coast (southeast regional Vic): 3
*Baw Baw (eastern regional Vic): 3
*Greater Bendigo (central regional Vic): 3
*Latrobe (eastern regional Vic): 2 (+1)
*Moorabool (western regional Vic): 2
*Ballarat (western regional Vic): 1 (+1)
*Northern Grampians 1 (+1)
*Swan Hill (northwest regional Vic): 1
*Warrnambool (southwest regional Vic): 1
*Surf Coast (southwest regional Vic): 1
*East Gippsland (east regional Vic): 1
*Greater Shepparton (northern regional Vic): 1
Interstate: 3
Unknown: 39 (+2)
TOTAL: 2128 (+197)
*Denotes LGAs outside the Melbourne metropolitan/Mitchell Shire lockdown
#Denotes LGAs with postcodes locked down from 11:59pm on July 1
Source: Victorian Department of Health and Human Services
Rosie Lewis 5.10pm: PM: Victoria spike worse than we hoped
Scott Morrison says NSW has shown how states can effectively respond to COVID-19 outbreaks without shutting down their economies, as he concedes the extent of cases in Victoria is “beyond what we would have hoped would have occurred”.
State premiers are being urged to reject an elimination strategy for coronavirus, which the Prime Minister said was “very risky” because it encouraged complacency but could still see outbreaks occur as they did via hotel quarantine in Melbourne.
With a record 317 new cases recorded in Victoria on Thursday and more than 2000 active cases, Mr Morrison said it was essential to get on top of contact tracing in the state, which was why the federal government had offered the support of more than 1000 Australian Defence Force Personnel to support health officers.
Mr Morrison said that NSW and Victoria had been the most supportive in the national cabinet of a suppression strategy to combat the virus.
He used NSW as an example of what states should do when there are coronavirus outbreaks, saying its health officials had moved “incredibly quickly” to investigate the cluster at the Crossroads Hotel in Casula that was likely started by a Melbourne truck driver.
There are 902 cases of coronavirus in Victoria with no identified source.
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Rachel Baxendale 4.40pm: 29 in Victorian ICUs, including five in their 40s
Five people in their 40s, six in their 50s and eight in their 60s are among 29 people with COVID-19 in Victoria’s intensive care wards.
Among the 17 men and 12 women, there are nine people in their 70s, and one woman in her 80s.
Nine people have died with coronavirus in Victoria since July 5.
They include a man in his 60s, a man in his 70s, three men and a woman in their 80s, and two men and a woman in their 90s.
The only person so far publicly identified among the recent dead is 90-year-old great-grandfather Alf Jordan who died on the night of July 10 after contracting the virus at the Glendale Aged Care home in Werribee, in Melbourne’s southwest.
At least 33 cases have so far been linked to the facility.
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Rachel Baxendale 4.20pm: No identified source for 902 Victorian cases
There have now been 902 cases of coronavirus in Victoria with no identified source, including 539 in the past fortnight, indicating the scale of community transmission being seen in the state.
There have also been 388 healthcare workers who have contracted the virus since the pandemic began, 150 of whom have active cases.
The Department of Health and Human Services said the “vast majority” of these cases “were acquired in the community”.
Given healthcare workers are some of the few cohorts in society undergoing routine testing, this again points to high levels of community transmission.
Of Victoria’s 317 new cases on Thursday, only 28 have so far been linked to known clusters, with the remaining 289 under investigation.
But here’s what we know about the size of clusters with new cases on Thursday:
- There are now 250 cases linked to public housing in North Melbourne and Flemington, in Melbourne’s inner northwest, up from 247 cases on Wednesday;
- There are now 41 cases linked to public housing in Carlton, in Melbourne’s inner north, up from 36 on Wednesday;
Victoria’s Department of Health and Human Services says “investigations are continuing” into “if and/or how” the cases in the towers in all three suburbs are linked.
In other outbreaks:
- 157 cases have been linked to Islamic school Al-Taqwa College in Truganina, in Melbourne’s outer west, up from 150 cases on Wednesday;
- 37 cases have been linked to Somerville Meats retail services in Tottenham, in Melbourne’s west, up from 33 on Wednesday;
- 31 cases have been linked to Menarock Life Aged Care Facility in Essendon, in Melbourne’s northwest, up from 29 on Wednesday;
- 29 cases have been linked to JBS abattoir in Brooklyn, in Melbourne’s west, up from 21 on Wednesday. This is in the same suburb as the Cedar Meats abattoir cluster which reached 111 cases in May;
- 23 cases (up from 13 on Monday) have been linked to Glendale Aged Care Facility in Werribee, in Melbourne’s outer southwest, including that of 90-year-old great-grandfather Alf Jordan, who died of COVID-19 last week;
- 21 cases have been linked to Estia Health aged care in Ardeer, in Melbourne’s west, up from 13 on Tuesday;
- 19 cases have been linked to the Northern Hospital, up from nine on Sunday;
- 16 cases have been linked to The Alfred hospital, up from eight on Sunday;
- 16 cases have been linked to Brunswick Private Hospital, up from 14 on Tuesday;
- 15 cases have been linked to LaManna Supermarket Essendon, up from 12 on Wednesday;
- Six cases have been linked to HWL Ebsworth Lawyers in Melbourne’s CBD in a previously unknown cluster;
- Five cases have been linked to St Basil’s Homes for the Aged in Fawkner, in Melbourne’s north, up from two on Wednesday.
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Rachel Baxendale 4pm: Victorian hospitals grapple with rising numbers
The Andrews government has moved to pause all Category Three elective surgery in Metropolitan Melbourne, as hospitals grapple with rising numbers of COVID-19 patients and quarantined healthcare workers.
Health Minister Jenny Mikakos said the move was aimed at ensuring sufficient spare beds and workforce capacity, amid 2128 known active coronavirus cases – 1686 more than a fortnight ago.
More urgent elective surgery will also be reduced to no more than 50 per cent of usual activity across all public hospitals and 75 per cent in private hospitals, enabling private hospitals to continue to take on public category one (emergency) and urgent category two surgery.
There will be no changes to elective surgery in regional Victoria.
On April 1 the Andrews government announced that they would spend $1.9bn adding 4000 ICU beds to what was then 476 beds across the state.
Ms Mikakos said on Thursday “more than 1,000 spaces for ICU and critical care beds” had now been created or upgraded to be suitable for coronavirus patients.
“Extra equipment continues to be delivered to activate these beds, with additional beds coming online each week while works are underway on converting more treatment spaces,” Ms Mikakos said.
The Health Minister announced $30m had been spent to recommission 84 beds at the former Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre, which will now be known as St Vincent’s on the Park.
“Those beds will be managed by St Vincent’s Hospital, given the proximity to their main campus, and this will enable them to have patients move there, and to create more capacity to deal with coronavirus patients on their main campus, close to their emergency department and to their ICU beds,” Ms Mikakos said.
“I want to take the opportunity to thank the 650 construction workers who worked over 60,000 hours to recommission the building.
“The building is now state of the art for a very old building, in terms of the space there that’s now available for additional patient capacity.”
Extra beds have also been delivered at Casey Hospital in Melbourne’s southeast, Baxter House in Geelong, Bendigo Hospital and Shepparton Hospital.
Ms Mikakos said there were plans in place to convert 1000 more critical care space to treat coronavirus cases in hospitals should demand surge.
“This includes upgrading operating theatres, recovery and other ward areas, emergency department spaces, and if really required, more beds can be opened in modular facilities in hospital carparks,” she said.
The Health Minister said more than 86 million gloves, 34 million surgical masks, 1.4 million N95 masks, 2.2 million face shields were now available in Victoria’s warehouse ready to be distributed to health services across the state.
There are also 1200 ventilators currently in hospitals with “hundreds more” warehoused, as well as more than 1,000 IV pumps and hundreds of patient monitors.
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Angelica Snowden 3.50pm: Aged care hot spot workers ordered to wear masks
All aged-care residential workers in Melbourne hotspots will now be required to wear surgical face masks to reduce the spread of the virus.
“No aged care or home care worker with any symptoms no matter how mild, should be attending work,” he said.
“People must be staying at home and arranging to get tested… to protect vulnerable Australians.”
In addition, Professor Kidd said all disability support workers should wear a face mask when they treat patients in areas with level three restrictions.
People with a disability - who are at a greater risk from COVID-19 - should now also wear a mask when they receive services.
“People with a disability and particularly those with intellectual disabilities have higher rates of chronic disease which is a significant risk factor for COVID-19,” he said.
“Many people with disability rely on support from family members, from carers and support workers and they may require close physical contact with a number of people each day which puts people at greater potential risk of exposure to the virus.”
Professor Kidd also confirmed that Scott Morrison has asked the Australian Health Protection Principal Committee for advice on whether freight drivers should be allowed to remain exempt from border crossing restrictions.
He said the AHPPC would discuss the question - including whether truck drivers should be allowed to enter pubs - on Friday.
Just three per cent of new COVID-19 cases in Australia during the past seven days have been overseas acquired.
The COVID-19 death toll has risen to 113 after two additional deaths were reported in Victoria overnight.
There are 114 people in hospital with COVID-19 across the country — 109 are in hospital in Victoria.
Among those in hospital 29 people are in intensive care units in Victoria and 22 people reported to be on ventilators.
66,000 tests were carried out nationwide yesterday, including 22,000 tests carried out in Victoria.
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Angelica Snowden 3.45pm: DCMO admits concern over rapid infectivity
Deputy Chief Medical Officer Michael Kidd has reported that at least one COVID-19 case in NSW became infectious within 24 hours of contracting the virus.
“The advice from infectious disease experts and the AHPPC is that while this is unusual, it is not implausible,” Professor Kidd said.
“There is a wide distribution in the incubation period for COVID-19 and the time that people become and remain infectious.
People usually develop symptoms within five to seven days of infection but may be infectious one or two days before the symptoms develop.
“As we see large numbers with COVID-19 infected, in Australia, we are starting to see examples of people with early infectivity.”
He says it is “unlikely the strain has changed”, and rather it is a matter of how it is “expressed in individual people”.
NSW Health Minister Brad Hazzard this morning revealed a young NSW pubgoer who caught coronavirus at the Crossroads Hotel in Casula had “one of the highest infection levels we’ve ever seen”
“We’ve got a young bloke from that latest cluster … he had one of the highest infection levels we’ve ever seen,” Mr Hazzard told Ben Fordham on 2GB.
“His viral load was quite capable of spreading it to anybody near him … we all need to be on high alert.”
Mr Hazzard said the information should serve as a dire warning to young people, who make up 40 per cent of coronavirus cases, that the virus was “extremely dangerous”.
Younger people rarely experience life-threatening symptoms but are proving to be more infectious than older people.
Angelica Snowden 3.35pm: 330 cases in 24 hours, and Victoria has lion’s share
Deputy Chief Medical Officer Michael Kidd says 330 cases of COVID-19 have been diagnosed across Australia in the last 24 hours.
He said of those cases 317 have been reported in Victoria – the highest daily total in the state since the pandemic began.
NSW reported 10 new cases, including six that were the result of community transmission and four diagnosed in hotel quarantine.
Two cases were recorded in returned overseas travellers in Western Australia.
One was recorded in South Australia.
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Tom Kington 2.55pm: Virus survivors haunted by fatigue, anxiety
Doctors are realising just how debilitating coronavirus is, with long-lasting damage, heart and memory problems months on.
Just as Italy was the first western country to be overwhelmed by coronavirus, with 35,000 dying to date, it has been among the first to slow the contagion and launch studies into the long-term effects on sufferers.
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Allysia Finley 2.44pm: The politics of hydroxychloroquine
Donald Trump touted it, Joe Biden denounces it. The FDA has suspended a permit for its use but do doctors think it works?
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Remy Varga 2.17pm: What stage four restrictions look like for Vic
Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews says the state government is planning for every single contingency as the state recorded 317 new cases of COVID-19 as well two more deaths.
READ the full story here
Angelica Snowden 2.12pm: SA records first new case in 17 days
South Australian Premier Steven Marshall says COVID-19 testing will be mandatory for any Victorian who travels to his state amid news a woman contracted the virus after she spent two weeks in Melbourne hotel quarantine.
The newest case in South Australia is the first in two weeks and brings the state’s total to 444.
Mr Marshall said the woman – who was an overseas returned traveller – returned two negative COVID-19 test results while in Melbourne.
“She undertook her two weeks of mandatory supervised quarantine in Victoria where she returned to negative PCR tests,” he said.
“Nevertheless she then travelled into South Australia.”
He said the latest result was a “low positive” and that the woman was not contagious.
“SA Health is not concerned about this person, although she is going to remain in 14 days of isolation,” he said.
The premier said we was “strengthening” the state’s response to the “situation which is occurring in Victoria”.
The new rules stipulate any Victorian who enters South Australia will now undergo two mandatory COVID-19 tests or risk an on-the-spot $1000 fine.
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Brent Read 1.43pm: Tigers players, staff tested for virus
Players and staff from the Wests Tigers have been sent for COVID-19 testing as the NRL fights to keep the Queensland government on side and prevent the competition suffering another setback.
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Greg Brown 12.56pm: ‘Aussies will lose jobs’: PM’s workplace warning
Scott Morrison has warned “Australians will lose their jobs” if flexible workplace relations rules are not extended past September.
The Prime Minister said businesses that had an uptick in turnover would still benefit from the short-term arrangements backed by the unions during the introduction of JobKeeper.
“We’ve got to be clear, if we return to the inflexibility during the course of this crisis of the industrial relations arrangements that existed prior to the introduction of JobKeeper, then Australians will lose their jobs,” the Prime Minister said.
“It will put people on the unemployment queues because businesses will not have the ability to ensure that work is able to be provided to more Australians to keep them in their jobs.
“We are working constructively to that end and as businesses, particularly those who are rebuilding, and they would have seen their turnover improved, they will still, I think, benefit from having those flexible arrangements which will keep more and more people in jobs.”
ACTU secretary Sally McManus last week warned unions may not support the extension of the flexible workplace reforms — aimed at giving bosses flexibility to reduce workers’ hours and change their roles, rosters’ and location — unless the JobKeeper scheme was extended in full beyond September.
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Joe Kelly 12.50pm: Australia ‘constructive in South China Sea’
Scott Morrison says that Australia played a “constructive role” in the South China Sea and advocated “very strongly for freedom of navigation through those waters” after the Trump administration declared most of China’s territorial claims in the region were illegal.
“Australia will continue to adopt a very supportive position,” Mr Morrison said. “We back that up with our own actions and initiatives in our own statements.”
“We will … continue to adopt a very consistent position. It’s a matter that is frequently raised when we have dialogue with our colleagues.”
Mr Morrison said it was an issue of “keen interest” in which Australia had engaged respectfully and proactively.”
Earlier this week, the US strengthened its policy on the South China Sea and aligned Washington with South East Asian nations — including Brunei, Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines, and Vietnam — who are contesting China’s territorial claims.
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo warned that the world would “not allow Beijing to treat the South China Sea as its maritime empire.”
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Joe Kelly 12.36pm: Victoria ‘beyond what we hoped would occur’
Scott Morrison has warned the situation in Victoria was “very concerning” and “beyond what … we hoped would have occurred.”
“That is why you have seen the scale of the response from the Commonwealth to support Victoria,” Mr Morrison said. “And that has resulted now in over 1000 ADF personnel now being rolled out.”
Mr Morrison said it was imperative to “get on top of the tracing challenge in Victoria” and that there was sufficient support from the ADF to assist Victorian health authorities in that task.
He was also “hopeful” that the infections in Victoria were “starting to level out.”
“I thought this would still be at a high level for some time, but as the effects of the lockdown kick-in, hopefully we will see those new case numbers fall.”
In relation to the situation in NSW, Mr Morrison said he was encouraged by the swiftness of the response to the outbreak at the Crossroads Hotel in Casula.
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Joe Kelly 12.18pm: Morrison unveils plan to get young back to work
Scott Morrison has unveiled his new plan to help train-up Australians and support more apprentices in a bid to strengthen the nation’s post-COVID workforce and ensure young people can find work.
Speaking at parliament house in Canberra, the Prime Minister said the government was “making a very big commitment of some $2bn in particular areas to support the upskilling and reskilling of Australians.”
Mr Morrison said the Commonwealth would be making a $500m investment — matched by the states and territories — to help train Australians in areas that needed new skilled workers.
He warned that many Australians would find it “sad” and “upsetting” because of the new difficulty they would encounter in finding new employment.
“We want to ensure they have the opportunity to make decisions and be able to find employment in other sectors potentially so they can actually move forward with their own lives,” he said.
In addition, Mr Morrison said the government would extend assistance to businesses to ensure about 180,000 apprentices could be supported until March 2021.
Mr Morrison said the government would provide for a “wage subsidy of up to $7000” and that the total cost of this measure would come in at about $1.5bn.
Mr Morrison also warned that Thursday’s unemployment figures — showing an increase in the unemployment rate to 7.4 per cent in June — had not factored in the shutdown in metropolitan Melbourne.
He warned of ongoing economic and health challenges for the country.
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Richard Ferguson 11.57am: Abbott: MPs need to share pain, cut pay
Former prime minister Tony Abbott has called on MPs and top bureaucrats to share the pain of the COVID-19 recession and take a temporary 20 per cent pay cut.
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PATRICK COMMINS 11.35am: Unemployment rate lifts to 7.4pc
Australia’s unemployment rate lifted to 7.4 per cent in June, from 7.1 per cent in the prior month, official labour force statistics show.
Employment jumped by 210,800 in the month, representing only a fraction of the 835,000 plunge in the number of employed over April and May as measures taken to suppress the spread of COVID-19 forced the closure of large segments of the economy.
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Rachel Baxendale 11.33am: We haven’t hit our peak, says Vic chief health officer
Victorian Chief Health Officer Brett Sutton acknowledged 317 new cases was Victoria’s biggest daily increase.
“I said yesterday, or earlier this week, we hadn’t hit our peak, Professor Sutton said.
“We may still not have hit our peak. It’s a big number. It needs to turn around. In some ways, I expect it to turn around this week, but as I always said, it’s no guarantee.
“It’s upon all of us to be able to turn this number around. The restrictions, the Stage Three restrictions have been in place for over a week, with an average incubation period of five or six days, plus the time for notification to get the numbers in, we would really expect a plateauing in the next couple of days.
“But we cannot be complacent and expect that’s going to happen automatically.
“It involves everyone limiting their interactions with others, staying at home, as per the directions, only leaving for those essential reasons, and absolutely isolating if they’re unwell, getting tested, and waiting for that result before they have any other interactions with their close contacts.”
Adeshola Ore 11.12am: 10 new cases in NSW, three related to cluster
NSW has recorded ten new cases of coronavirus, including three cases linked to the Crossroads Hotel outbreak.
The three cases linked to Crossroads are:
— a child of a previously known case
— a man in 30s who is a close contact of a previously known case
— a man in his 80s who attended Crossroads on July 5.
Four of the 10 new cases have been recorded in returned hotel quarantine
NSW Chief Health Officer Dr Kerry Chant said the community transmission cases highlighted the need for people to be vigilant in following health precautions.
Three cases are from community transmission, with no known source of infection.
Dr Chant confirmed Hurricane’s Grill in Brighton-Le-Sands has been closed for deep cleaning, after a teenager attended the restaurant on July 11 with a known case. There are now two COVID-19 cases linked to the venue, one who attended while infectious. NSW Health is undergoing contract tracing of the restaurant’s patrons.
Another case was a returned traveller from Victoria who flew into Ballina on Jetstar flight JQ466, arriving on July 12. Ms Chant said the person was wearing a surgical mask and has been self-isolating since arriving in the state.
Ms Chant said NSW was at a “critical point” and urged anyone with even mild symptoms to self-isolate and come forward for testing.
Rachel Baxendale 11.03am: Victoria records 317 new cases
Victoria has recorded 317 new cases of COVID-19 on Thursday – the highest daily increase on record.
There have also been two deaths since Wednesday, the sixth and seventh in six days, after two men in their 80s died in hospital.
Victoria’s COVID-19 death toll is now 29.
The state now has 2128 active cases, 1765 more than a fortnight ago.
There have now been 4750 cases since the pandemic began.
Of the 317, 28 have been linked to known outbreaks, while 289 remain under investigation.
There are 109 people in hospital, 29 of whom are in intensive care.
The 317 positives on Thursday come after 28,607 tests were processed on Wednesday, representing a 1.11 per cent positive test rate.
This is the second-highest positive test rate on record, after 1.23 per cent on Tuesday.
There have been 1,225,999 tests conducted since the pandemic began.
Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews said the number represented “relative stability” given the stay-at-home orders across metropolitan Melbourne and the Mitchell Shire were only imposed a week ago.
Stay-at-home orders in 36 hotspot postcodes were imposed a fortnight ago.
“One of the other challenges of course is that the life cycle of this virus is that actions you take today … are not reflected for at least a week, and to be safe, two weeks’ time,” Mr Andrews said.
He said he had “no announcements” to make on Thursday about any move to Stage Four restrictions.
“It’s well too early for us to be moving to a whole new stage,” Mr Andrews said.
Sarah Elks 10.55am Queensland not planning to shut borders again
Queensland is not planning to shut its borders again, despite the escalation of the coronavirus outbreaks in NSW and Victoria.
The state’s border reopened to all interstate visitors last Friday, except for people who had been to Victoria in the past 14 days.
Two areas of Sydney — Campbelltown and Liverpool — were added to Queensland’s hot spot list and banned on Tuesday.
Ms Palaszczuk told the Nine Network on Thursday morning that she was not considering another closure of the border.
“Look, we’re not factoring that in at the moment because we’re very happy with the checks that are happening at the border. There are delays. We are trying to make it easier for those border communities. We know how hard it is between the Tweed and southern part of the Gold Coast,” Ms Palaszczuk said.
“We’ve asked people to plan their trips if they’re coming from other parts of NSW but we’re also asking people to do the right thing and if they are sick do not come into Queensland. We’ve increased our testing of course across Queensland and we have almost finished the testing of the people who did attend that Crossroads Hotel so I think there’s just one outstanding test there.”
Since that time, all 19 Queenslanders have returned negative tests.
Ms Palaszczuk said she did initially suggest to the NSW government (before the Queensland border was closed in May) that the Queensland border be temporarily shifted south, to the Tweed River, to allow residents to more easily cross into Queensland.
“Yeah, I put that to NSW and they rejected it,” Ms Palaszczuk said.
“This was right from the very beginning to make the Tweed River the border so those border communities could go backwards and forwards and that was rejected.”
READ MORE: Virus threat outweighed right to freedom
Rachel Baxendale 10.45am: LIVE: Andrews to announce Victoria’s latest numbers
Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews is due to hold a press conference at 11.00am. You can watch it live here. The number of new cases is expected to be over 300.
NSW Chief Health Officer Dr Kerry Chant is also expected to deliver an update on NSW cases at 11.00am.
Richard Ferguson 10.27am: Frydenberg on Five Eyes call over recovery
Josh Frydenberg has spoken with Five Eyes finance ministers this morning to discuss how Australia, Canada, Great Britain and the United States can get people back into work post-COVID.
The Treasurer has been holding regular calls with his Five Eyes counterpart — as first revealed by The Australian — as the partnership extends from intelligence to economic co-operation during the pandemic.
“During the call, we exchanged views on policies to protect jobs during the crisis and to get people back into work as quickly as possible as our economies begin to recover,” Mr Frydenberg said.
“Our governments have all taken unprecedented steps to restrict movement to slow the spread of the virus. The largest impacts of this have been on the jobs market. We have already seen the loss of hundreds of millions of jobs globally. A strong labour market is essential to our respective economic recoveries.”
US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, British Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak, and Canadian Finance Minister Bill Morneau were all on the phone hook-up.
New Zealand Finance Minister Grant Robertson was unable to join the group, but Mr Frydenberg said he looked forward to Mr Robertson joining their next discussion.
READ MORE: Canada now ‘weakest link’ over Huawei
Samantha Bailey 10.23am: ‘We need to improve lockdown management’
Business Council of Australia chief executive Jennifer Westacott has warned of serious economic consequences, if Australia doesn’t get better at managing COVID-19 lockdowns.
“We are in for a long-haul,” she told Fran Kelly on ABC’s RN Breakfast this morning.
“We have to get a better system for managing these lockdowns so that the community knows the rules, business knows the rules, and we can try and make sure that we can open up as much of the economy as we can.
“We’re talking about people not being able to put food on the table for their kids, pay their bills, get through winter.
“We’ve got to try and make sure this suppression strategy works effectively.”
Her comments come after the government announced a $2.5 billion “JobTrainer” package this morning, to save apprentices and reskill young workers who have lost their jobs as a result of the coronavirus crisis.
“I haven’t seen all the detail yet but this is exactly, and you and I have talked about this quite a few times, this is exactly what we’ve been calling for,” Ms Westacott said.
READ MORE: Trading Day — Five-week highs within reach
Sarah Elks 10.07am: Queensland visitors to Crossroads all clear
Queensland has recorded no new coronavirus cases overnight, with just four active cases in the state.
There are 2000 active cases in Australia.
Deputy Premier Steven Miles told state parliament the 19 Queenslanders who had visited the Crossroads Hotel in Sydney had all tested negative to coronavirus.
Queensland has had a total of 1071 COVID-19 cases.
READ MORE: Top tourism spots eye local travel cash splash
Hannah Moore 9.49am: Young pubgoer had ‘highest of infection levels’
A young man who caught coronavirus at the Crossroads Hotel in Casula had “one of the highest infection levels we’ve ever seen”, NSW Health Minister Brad Hazzard has revealed.
“We’ve got a young bloke from that latest cluster … he had one of the highest infection levels we’ve ever seen,” Mr Hazzard told Ben Fordham on 2GB.
“His viral load was quite capable of spreading it to anybody near him … we all need to be on high alert.”
Mr Hazzard said the information should serve as a dire warning to young people, who make up 40 per cent of coronavirus cases, that the virus was “extremely dangerous”.
Younger people rarely experience life-threatening symptoms but are proving to be more infectious than older people.
“I’ve been talking to the health tracers, and they tell me young people get out and about in the evening and they go a lot of places,” he said.
“They can be super spreaders with great skill and acumen.”
There have been 34 cases in New South Wales linked to the outbreak at the Sydney pub, with new cases popping up all over the state daily.
In response, the NSW government has tightened restrictions around pubs, lowering the gathering limit from 20 to 10, and promised to crack down on businesses that don’t have a COVID-safe plan or are not following it.
“This virus is still out and about,” Mr Hazard said.
“As I said to someone yesterday, it’s a very speedy virus, it could win a gold medal at the Olympics. Until we can get a vaccine, there’s no way we’re out of the woods.”
The Crossroads cluster is believed to have stemmed from a Melbourne man who worked for a freight company and was visiting an office in Sydney.
Health tracers say he and several of his colleagues went to the pub for a work party on July 3, leading to an outbreak that has since spread across Sydney to more than 20 businesses from Highfields in Caringbah to Macarthur Tavern in Campbelltown.
READ MORE: Vaccine nearer after trials success
Anthony Piovesan 9.28am: Nestle factory worker tests positive
A Nestle factory site in Melbourne’s north has closed after a staff member tested positive for coronavirus.
Deep cleaning is under way at the food giant’s Campbellfield site, with all staff ordered to self-isolate at home.
Workers unable to work from home will be placed on leave until the factory off the Hume Highway reopens.
Nestle spokesperson Margaret Stuart said the company had started contact tracing in partnership with the Department of Health and Human Services.
She also said no one onsite met the Federal Government’s close contact criteria guidelines.
“Over recent months, we have taken a number of steps to help keep our employees and their families safe, adapting our activities on site to maintain two metres social distancing and increasing cleaning and sanitising,” Ms Stuart said.
“Wearing masks in the factory has been mandatory for some weeks, and masks have also been available for direct family members.
“In line with our commitment, each and every one of us will continue to strictly adopt all the government recommended measures to keep our colleagues, business partners and consumers safe.”
READ MORE: Jury out on fever checks at schools
Yoni Bashan 9.10am: How NSW may tighten restrictions further
The NSW government is moving towards a further tightening of COVID-19 restrictions for at-risk businesses, a pre-emptive measure designed to quell infection rates in the community and limit future outbreaks.
Senior government ministers met on Wednesday night to discuss adjustments to existing public health orders that would ratchet up restrictions for indoor venues that attract high numbers of people.
READ the full story here
Adeshola Ore 8.58am: List of venues closed in Sydney’s Crossroads cluster
A south-western Sydney cafe is the latest business to be affected by a coronavirus outbreak in the region.
In a Facebook post, Frankie’s Food in Milperra said a patron who visited their venue had tested positive to COVID-19.
A number of Sydney businesses have been visited by confirmed cases from the Crossroads Hotel outbreak, including:
Planet Fitness, Casula
The Wests League Club, Leumeah
Mancini’s Original Woodfired Pizza, Belfield
Macarthur Tavern, Campbelltown
Picton Hotel, Picton
Woolworths, Bowral
Kmart, Casula
Milky Lane, Parramatta
Star Casino, Sydney
The Canterbury Leagues Club, Belmore
Zone Bowling, Villawood
Bavarian Macarthur, Campbelltown
Bankstown YMCA. Revesby
The Canterbury Leagues Club, Belmore
READ MORE: Crossroads cluster traced to interstate truckie
Cameron Stewart 8.54am: Fauci calls on White House to end political games
The top US infectious diseases expert Anthony Fauci has called on the White House to stop playing political games and focus on tracking the coronavirus pandemic as infection rates continue to soar across the nation.
Dr Fauci’s comments come after Donald Trump’s trade adviser wrote an apparently unauthorised op-ed blasting the disease expert.
READ the full story here
David Swan 8.48am: Biden, Gates Twitter accounts hacked
Twitter has disabled all ‘verified’ accounts, after the official Twitter accounts of Apple, Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos and others were hijacked by scammers trying to dupe people into sending cryptocurrency bitcoin, in a massive hack of the social media platform.
The list of accounts commandeered simultaneously grew rapidly to include Joe Biden, Barack Obama, Uber, Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, bitcoin specialty firms and many others.
Posts, which were largely deleted, were fired off from the array of high-profile accounts telling people they had 30 minutes to send $US1000 in bitcoin in order to be sent back twice as much.
READ the full story here
Greg Sheridan 8.30am: If we let up, virus toll will just spiral
All the science tells us that herd immunity is impossible to achieve without a vaccine.
We stand at a dangerous crossroads in the fight against COVID-19.
The outbreak in Victoria is less our second wave than our first wave of community transmission. Despite its mistakes, the Victorian government’s lockdown actions are sensible and necessary.
Australia faces a potential health disaster. The next week or two are critical.
READ Greg Sheridan’s full column here
Adeshola Ore 8.00am: Queensland goes another day without a case
Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk has confirmed the state recorded zero cases of coronavirus overnight.
On Monday, Queensland had one new case of the virus in a returned traveller in hotel quarantine.
Ms Palaszczuk said complete elimination of coronavirus was not possible, despite the state’s low level of active cases.
“While we still have returning Australians coming back from virus hot spots, there is always that chance that the virus can get back into the community,” she told Sky News.
“Everyone would love to have elimination, but suppression is the reality of what we are living with at the moment.”
Ms Palaszczuk says the state is “more than happy” to host Victorian AFL teams.
On Wednesday, the Premier agreed to allow all Victorian clubs to be based in the state, after a morning phone call with AFL chief executive Gillon McLachlan.
Ms Palaszczuk said the matches would be played at a range of stadiums, including Metricon in the Gold Coast and The Gabba in Brisbane.
“The Townsville Mayor was on to me just the other night saying could she have Collingwood up there. Everyone’s trying to help out as much as they possibly can,” she told Sky News.
Ms Palaszczuk said Queensland should be considered as a potential host of the AFL grand final for doing the “heavy-lifting” of welcoming Victorian teams.
“I said to Gill [ McLachlan] if we are doing the heavy-lifting we would like to be considered for a grand final. It’s only fair,” she told the ABC.
“We firmly believe that Queensland could host it here.”
READ MORE: Welcome to footy’s new home
Adeshola Ore 7.41am: Grim warning as 39 aged care homes affected
Aged Care Minister Richard Colbeck says coronavirus is now present in 39 nursing homes across Victoria, warning “there is more bad news coming.”
Senator Colbeck said 45 residents across eighty facilities in the state had contracted the virus.
Senator Colbeck said all COVID-19 positive residents at Menarock Life aged-care facility, where 15 residents are infected, would be moved to hospital today.
“The issue there is being able to effectively isolate and separate residents so that they do not spread the virus within the facility,” he told Channel 9 on Thursday morning.
READ MORE: Unemployment soars in Liberal heartland
Adeshola Ore 7.31am: Crossroads cases set to rise again today
NSW Health Minister Brad Hazzard says the number of cases linked to the Crossroads Hotel outbreak is expected to rise today.
The south-western Sydney cluster is now linked to 34 cases. On Wednesday, NSW Health identified “patient zero”, a Melbourne freight worker who travelled into NSW on June 30 before visiting the pub.
Mr Hazzard said the cluster, which had infected a number of young people, showed nobody was immune to the virus.
“We all need to be on high alert, for our grandparents and our parents who are in the over 60s age category,” he told 2GB radio on Thursday morning.
“We really need younger people to wake up to the fact that they can be very dangerous to older people.”
READ MORE: State health in no McFlurry to test
Adeshola Ore 7.18am: Young worker training ‘must be linked to jobs’
Employment Minister Michaelia Cash says the federal government’s $2.5 billion lifeline package for young workers will be targeted towards areas of demand.
The JobTrainer scheme aims to save apprentices and reskill those who have lost work in the pandemic.
Ms Cash said the training would begin for eligible participants in September and October.
“We already know what some of the areas of demand are. We will continue to work with the states and territories to identify future areas of demand.,” she told Channel 9 on Thursday morning.
“You could be doing a short course in October this year at almost a low cost or no cost and going straight into a job.”
Ms Cash said “training must be linked to jobs.”
As part of the program, 340,000 young and laid-off workers will be retrained and reskilled. A further 100,000 apprentices will have wage subsidies extended until March 2021.
READ MORE: $2.5bn rescue package for young workers
Adeshola Ore 6.55am: US records highest single day case numbers yet
The US has recorded more than 67,000 coronavirus cases in a single day – the highest number in a 24-hour period according to the John Hopkins University. It comes as Walmart, the world’s largest retailer, announced all customers would be required to wear masks in store, in response to the recent surge in cases. Only a handful of national retail stores, including Costco, Apple and Best Buy, have policies requiring masks at all of their stores.
Russia says their first clinical trial of a potential coronavirus vaccine has proved safe, with volunteers developing an immune response. A selection of volunteers told a crowd at Sechenov University that they had experienced few side effects from the vaccine.
A large-scale trial of the vaccine, to determine the strength of the immune response it produces, will begin in mid-August. More than 100 possible vaccines are being developed and tested around the world, including 19 human trials. Two are in the final phase – one by China’s Sinopharm and another by AstraZeneca and the University of Oxford.
Ireland has delayed its easing of lockdown measures due to a rise in coronavirus cases among younger people. Pubs and nightclubs will now open three weeks later on August 10. The country was due to enter the fourth and final phase of restrictions on July 20, which would have included allowing indoor gatherings of up to 100 people.
The country’s chief medical officer said Ireland remained in a “good position” in regards to COVID-19, but the number of cases over the past two weeks had increased from 3.9 per 100,000 from a low of 2.5 per 100,000. The government will also order the wearing of masks by customers in shops.
Globally, more than 13.4 million people have been infected by the virus. There have been more than 580,000 recorded coronavirus deaths, according to the John Hopkins University tally.
READ MORE: ‘Massive’ rental income drops for malls
Agencies 6.45am: Trump slams aide for ‘unauthorised’ Fauci attack
A senior White House trade adviser criticised Dr. Anthony Fauci, the government’s top infectious disease expert, in an opinion column that the White House said wasn’t authorised.
In the column published Tuesday night in USA Today, Peter Navarro wrote, “Dr. Anthony Fauci has a good bedside manner with the public, but he has been wrong about everything I have interacted with him on.”
He added that he listens to Dr. Fauci “with scepticism and caution.” Some administration officials have ramped up their public and private criticism of Dr. Fauci in recent days, but the White House on Wednesday distanced itself from Mr. Navarro’s column.
When asked about the column, President Trump said that Mr. Navarro wasn’t speaking on behalf of the administration.
“Well he made a statement representing himself,” Mr. Trump told reporters outside the White House. “He shouldn’t be doing that. No, I have a very good relationship with Anthony.” Mr. Navarro didn’t respond to a request for comment.
“The Peter Navarro op-ed didn’t go through normal White House clearance processes and is the opinion of Peter alone. @realDonaldTrump values the expertise of the medical professionals advising his Administration,” Alyssa Farah, the White House’s director of strategic communications wrote on Twitter.
Dow Jones
READ MORE: Spontaneity is out the window
Agencies 6.25am: Oklahoma governor first state leader to test positive
The governor of Oklahoma has become the first US governor to test positive for the coronavirus, weeks after he attended Donald Trump’s campaign rally in Tulsa.
Cases have surged in Oklahoma, and local health officials have said that Mr Trump’s indoor rally and large public protests in June “more than likely” contributed to the spike in new infections.
Governor Kevin Stitt said it was unlikely he contracted it at the June 20 rally because the event occurred too long ago.
“I got tested yesterday for COVID-19, and the results came back positive,” Mr Stitt told an online press conference.
He said he was “a little bit achy” on Tuesday but otherwise felt “fine.” The 47-year-old Republican said he immediately placed himself in quarantine away from his family and will work from home until he is free of the virus.
Stitt has often declined to wear a mask at meetings and did not wear one at the Trump rally, but he is urging residents to take precautions.
“We know it’s here in Oklahoma, it’s not going away,” Mr Stitt said. “We need to take this virus seriously” and Oklahomans should “continue to get tested,” he added.
READ MORE: Vaccine nearer after US trial success
Rachel Baxendale 6.00am: Contact tracers swamped as count surges
In a clear demonstration of just how widespread the virus is across the city, all 32 locked-down local government areas across metropolitan Melbourne and the Mitchell Shire on Wednesday had at least three known active cases of COVID-19.
In 24 of these, there were at least 10 cases while 12 had at least 50 cases.
In a further indication of the challenge facing authorities with Victoria’s second wave, there have been 790 cases of COVID-19 with no identified source, including 458 in the fortnight to Wednesday, with cases added to that tally only once the contact tracing process has been completed.
Another 209 of Victoria’s 238 new COVID-19 cases on Wednesday remained “under investigation” as contact tracing teams struggled to keep up with 1931 active cases and their close contacts — 1516 more than they were dealing with two weeks ago.
READ the full story here
Olivia Caisley 5.45am: Restrictions will hamper bushfire efforts: RFS
The NSW Rural Fire Service has said the ability of firefighters to tackle blazes next summer could be severely undermined by the COVID-19 pandemic.
The Royal Commission into National Natural Disaster Arrangements heard on Wednesday that firefighting created an “ideal environment” for the transmission of infectious diseases, with volunteers working in proximity to one another.
Rob Rogers, who will on Thursday be confirmed as the permanent Rural Fire Service commissioner after having acted in that role for several months, told the commission that working conditions at firefronts were favourable for infection because of the lack of access to soap or hand sanitiser, and a constant moving of volunteers across state lines.
“If we have got fires that are being managed, you could take out potentially hundreds of people in the need to isolate those people in case they are infectious,” Mr Rogers said.
READ the full story here.
Steve Jackson 5.30am: Ruby Princess given ‘outdated form’ by NSW Health
Critical failings by NSW Health – including an “unacceptable” delay in testing passenger swab samples and its reliance on an out-dated biosecurity risk assessment form – allowed COVID-infected guests to disembark the Ruby Princess cruise liner and scatter across the country in the nation’s worst coronavirus outbreak.
A special commission of inquiry into the fiasco has heard all passengers and crew should have been forced to wait on board the troubled liner until testing was complete, and placed in mandatory, government-run quarantine as soon as the first person tested positive for the contagion.
The scandal, which has since been linked to more than 20 deaths across Australia, unfolded after the Ruby Princess docked in Sydney on March 19. Classified a low biosecurity risk, the ship’s 2700 passengers were permitted to debark and return home more than 24 hours before testing confirmed some were infected with the novel coronavirus.
READ the full story here.
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