Victoria ranks among African, other developing nations for coronavirus increase

If Victoria were a country, it would rank 13th in the world for the greatest increase in COVID-19 cases, in percentage terms, since June 26.

Empty Melbourne streets on Wednesday. Picture: Alex Coppel

They say you are judged by the company you keep — and for ­Victoria it would be an eclectic group indeed.

If Australia’s coronavirus-stricken state were a country, it would rank 13th in the world for the greatest increase in COVID-19 cases, in percentage terms, since June 26, according to analysis of data from Johns Hopkins University.

African countries dominate the top 20 countries, taking up 11 places including the top three: Lesotho, Namibia and Gambia.

 

Papua New Guinea, which had just 10 recorded cases on June 26 and is now up to 114, comes in fourth. The rest are a mixture of mostly developing nations from South and Central America, Asia, the Middle East and eastern ­Europe.

After Wednesday’s record total of 725 new cases, Victoria has seen its COVID-19 caseload increase by about 570 per cent since June 26, or almost seven-fold, to 13,060.

In the past 24 hours, Victoria overtook Madagascar, whose President Andry Rajoelina has made headlines over claims his ­island nation had discovered that a traditional African herbal medicine — artemisia annua, or sweet wormwood — was a cure for COVID-19. The World Health Organisation is yet to be convinced he’s right.

While many of the places above Victoria on the list have come off a very low base for ­infections, some had well-­established caseloads by late June.

Kyrgyzstan’s cases ­jumped from just under 4000 to more than 36,500; the Palestinian ­territories have seen an increase from about 1400 to almost 13,000; and Costa Rica has almost reached 20,000 cases, up from about 2700.

Of course, many nations have had far greater increases in raw numbers than Victoria’s 11,088 since June 26.

The US has had another 2.36 million infections over the same period, almost doubling its total to 4.77 million; Brazil and India have each added more than one million; and South Africa has gone up by more than 400,000 to be the fifth-ranked country for coronavirus cases in the world.

In per-capita terms, though, Victoria would still rank 43rd in the world for post-June 26 infections, slightly behind Sweden but ahead of almost every western European nation.