From midnight on Tuesday, the borders between New South Wales and Victoria will close, according to a joint decision made between Premiers Daniel Andrews of Victoria, NSw’s Gladys Berejiklian and Australian Prime Minister, Scott Morrison. It’s the first time since 1919 that the border between the two most populous Australian states has been closed. The Spanish Flu pandemic was the cause of the border closure then.
“This is one of those precautionary measures, it is one of those things that I think will help us in broader terms to contain the spread of the virus,” Daniel Andrews stated adding that there would be a permit system and other arrangements in place for people living in the border communities so that they could access essential services.
Mr Andrews said that the border closure would be enforced on the NSW side. With 50 border crossings between the two states, it would be a hard task for NSW to monitor the crossings.
However, according to NSW Police Commissioner Mick Fuller, the police was aware of all the places, where people could hike or even swim across the border.
“There will be drones and other aerial surveillance at tracks. We will be focusing on roads, because we know that is where most of the vehicle traffic (will be),” he said, adding that even tracks and rivers would be policed.
The fines imposed on anyone caught crossing the border will be $11,000 or six months’ jail.
Border permits to be set up for border communities
NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian has asked for patience from border communities, and added that the work to set up the permit-application process to cross the border, which could would be completed within three days.
She asked for people to stay home until the service was up and running, which could be as soon as tomorrow.
“Once you have a permit, because you are in a border community, or someone who might be taking timber to and from the port of Eden, you will be able to maintain that permit through the course of the duration, so long as you don’t present with symptoms,” she said.
There had been no indication on how long the border closure was expected to last. Ms Berejiklian said only that she hoped it was a temporary move.
“It is in our national interest and our state’s interests to have the Victorian government contain the virus. And so I hope it won’t be for a long time, but I don’t want to put a time-frame on it. It will be based on health advice.”
Tower lockdown could last longer than five days
The “extreme” lockdown of 3,000 residents in the public housing estates in the inner northwest of Melbourne, could last longer than five days, Premier Daniel Andrews stated earlier today.
According to statements by Mr Andrews, the residents might have to stay inside for a period of 14 days – documents that the residents had to sign when the lock-down was imposed also referred to that timeframe.
“The order was made for 14 days but it can be rescinded earlier than that,” Mr Andrews said.
The testing of all residents in the towers was crucial and would determine the length of the tower lockdown. On Sunday, 400 tests were completed and health authorities were aiming to further accelerate testing, with special laboratory capacity to speed up testing.
Mr Andrews said that there had been 26 more cases of COVID-19 found in the towers (16 new cases and 10 cases from earlier testing) bringing the total number of cases to 53.
The Premier said he was confident that testing of the entire community would be completed within five days.
“Once all 3,000 residents are tested, we will have more options based on data and hopefully that means we can have a different set of rules.”
Victoria records 127 new coronavirus cases overnight and two deaths
The deadly virus claimed another life in Victoria overnight, a man is his 90s died in hospital, and a man in his 60s died earlier today bringing the state’s coronavirus death toll to 22.
From the new cases, 34 were connected to known and contained outbreaks, 40 were from routine testing and 53 were under investigation.
There were 24,528 tests conducted yesterday. There are 31 Victorians currently in hospital with COVID-19 and five of those are in intensive care.