Daniel Andrews has made clear that this unprecedented testing blitz either works or Australia will have the second wave it neither wants nor needs.
”This is a public health bushfire,’’ the Victorian Premier warned.
The testing will be focused initially on the northern suburb of Broadmeadows and the northwestern suburb of Keilor Downs.
It will then be widened to a total of 10 suburbs across Melbourne, in what are the community transmission hubs across the city, which run right down to Melbourne’s southeast.
One family outbreak in Keilor Downs has led to an extraordinary cluster of 19 cases.
The government is focused on predominantly lower socio-economic areas and where there are high rates of multiculturalism.
This has been a trend around the world, where the disease starts with overseas travellers and then spreads like wildfire across the community, often hitting the people least well placed to deal with it.
Andrews also is making clear that the reported infection rates will continue to climb, possibly for weeks.
The core to this narrative is that the more people are tested, inevitably there will be higher infection rates recorded, which is common sense.
Despite the gloom, the underlying commentary from both the state and federal governments is that it is possible to deal with these localised infections.
This makes it something like an Australian version of Boris Johnson’s “whack-a-mole” strategy of striking in areas where the virus raises its head.
The challenge will be keeping the virus isolated to these 10 suburbs and hope that it hasn’t already spread widely in other areas
Victoria’s very high testing rates would suggest public health officials have an awful lot of data upon which to base their decisions.
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