Coronavirus: ‘you’d be mad’ to let pariah states in

University of Melbourne epidemiologist Tony Blakely,

Australia risks becoming a divided country until a COVID-19 vaccine is found, because the successfu­l states would be “mad” to open up their borders to Victoria and NSW, an eminent epidem­iologist has warned.

Melbourne University profes­sor Tony Blakely says the other states would be very unwise­ to open their borders to states with significant virus spread.

Dr Blakely said Victoria had a standout problem with the virus, with surging infection rates and deaths, but that NSW may also be problematic for the successful states and territories.

He said Australia’s suppres­sion strategy meant that the aim was not to eliminate but keep infections suppressed, which meant there was always a risk of an outbreak in states like Victoria.

He said the premiers of the three mainland states that had controlled the viruses would think hard about their next steps.

“You’d be mad to open your borders to someone like Victoria or even NSW at the moment,” he told The Weekend Australian. “Absolutely mad.

“There is a real risk we are going to end up with a split country until we get a vaccine.” He said Victoria was in a bind but the decision to make masks mandatory, plus several other meas­ures, could go a long way towards turning around the spike in the virus.

Victoria recorded 300 new cases on Friday and six deaths. The Andrews government is hoping that Lockdown 2.0 and masks, combined with greater community compliance, will greatly help the fight.

Victoria is already 2½ weeks into the second lockdown and this week broke records on the number of cases added to the virus toll.

The 300 new cases announced on Friday is lower than on several other days in the past week.

NSW and South Australia are unlikely to open their ­borders to Victorians for months, although this could change if the government is able to arrest the number of cases.

“No other state in their right mind would want to open their borders to us because the chance of the virus jumping across and taking off is high,” Dr Blakely said.

Queensland recorded two new coronavirus cases and its ­residents were warned to rethink travel plans to NSW, which recorde­d seven extra cases on ­Friday.

South Australia is tightening its border controls with Victoria, imposing a hard border with its eastern neighbour from midnight on Tuesday.

Tasmania will reopen its borders to South Australia, Western Australia and the Northern Territory, but not other jurisdictions, from August 7.

Dr Blakely said the use of masks in Victoria could become a standout measure that helps reduce­ the surge in cases.

He said stage-four restrictions were used rarely because of the impac­t on the economy.

Economic measures to make Victorians more likely to get tested and stay at home until the tests were taken were important for the community and would have an effect.

“I think that’s excellent: now, will that turn the curve? I don’t know,’’ he said.

“There’s just layer upon layer of things we are doing.’’

Victoria’s Chief Health Officer Brett Sutton said a harsher shutdown could introduce greater harms to the community.

“You can go to a very, very broad shutdown,” he said.

“It will have its own harms and may not turn around the transmission because of where we’re seeing the transmission occurring.’’

Scott Morrison has reaffirmed his support for the suppression strategy over elimination. “There will always be cases that come, ­because Australia has not complete­ly shut itself off from the world,” the Prime Minister said.