Coronavirus: Western Australia not wild about opening its border

WA’s air border with Victoria will remain closed for at least a few more days and the state is almost certain to be shut to South Australians this Christmas.

West Australian Premier Mark McGowan. Picture: Getty Images

Western Australia’s border with Victoria — for air, land and sea transport — will remain closed for at least a few more days and the state is almost certain to be shut to South Australians this Christmas after Premier Mark McGowan turned his back on advice from his Chief Health Officer.

Victoria on Friday celebrated 28 days without any community transmission of the coronavirus, achieving elimination and reaching the threshold previously set by WA’s Chief Health Officer Andrew Robertson for the removal of quarantine requirements for arrivals from that state.

Dr Robertson last month said it would be safe to drop the need for two weeks of quarantine for arrivals from Victoria and NSW once those states achieved 28 days without the virus.

But Mr McGowan said Victorians would need to continue to wait until at least next week before they could enter WA, dis­appointing families who had hoped to reunite this weekend.

Instead, the Premier said he would wait until he had seen updated guidance from Dr Robertson and had consulted with WA’s police commissioner before making a final decision on the border.

He defended the delay by ­saying WA had been well served to date by its cautious approach.

“For the past eight months I have been pushed to do things that would have been mistakes,” he said. “We are very keen to avoid mistakes. We have a great thing going in Western Australia, and we don’t want to make a mistake and get it wrong.”

He noted there had previously been strong pressure on WA to open its borders just before the second wave of the virus hit Victoria. “Had I made the decision people wanted us to, the virus would have come back and we would have had to shut our economy down like Victoria did,” he said. “Just a few weeks ago we made the decision to go to the controlled border, then South Australia had an outbreak almost immediately.

“You don’t know what’s around the corner and you don’t want to make a mistake, that’s why we will take health advice over coming days and make an announcement next week.”

WA’s reluctance to reopen the border comes despite the fact there are 32 people currently infected with coronavirus in WA’s quarantine hotels, meaning the state now presents a greater risk of causing an outbreak than Victoria, which has zero cases.

AMA president Omar Korshid said that while Mr McGowan had protected West Australians well from the virus, “there is no risk of contracting COVID from a Victorian if there’s no community transmission in Victoria”.

“So I think the time is certainly coming that the West Australian border will open to other states, and in particular to Victoria.”

Federal Health Minister Greg Hunt said the advice from Acting Chief Medical Officer Paul Kelly was that there was “no basis on commonwealth definitions for any state or territory to be closed to any state or territory”.

“We are respectful of the different roles and decisions of each state and territory, but we would encourage them to look at the epidemiology,” Mr Hunt said.

WA this month dropped its mandatory two-week quarantine requirements for arrivals from Queensland, Tasmania, SA, the Northern Territory and the ACT but reintroduced restrictions for South Australia just a day later after it suffered an outbreak.

With the state still recording new cases, Mr McGowan said it was unlikely people would be able to arrive from SA by Christmas without going into quarantine.

WA’s tough border stance has proved immensely popular in the state, causing Mr McGowan to emerge as the most post popular premier in the country.