Another 10 people have died from COVID-19 in Victoria on the state's deadliest day during the pandemic.
There were 42 patients in ICU with the virus and more than 42,000 tests were conducted on Saturday — the highest number ever.
Premier Daniel Andrews revealed the latest details, while Ambulance Victoria chief executive Tony Walker spoke about his organisation's collaboration with the Defence Force.
Here's what else they had to say at today's press conference.
The stats out of Victoria today:
- 8,181 infected; 4,233 active cases
- 459 more than yesterday
- 228 patients in hospital; 42 patients in ICU
- 71 lives lost in total
- 10 more deaths — seven men and three women; the men were aged between 40 and 80, the women in their 70s and 80s
- There were 42,573 tests yesterday — the highest number since the beginning of the pandemic
Aged care remains an area of concern
Of the 10 fatalities, seven are linked to aged-care outbreaks.
Three are not linked to any outbreak.
"There are some 560 active cases in aged care," Mr Andrews said.
He also said while the aged care sector was regulated and run by the Federal Government, "individual operators, individual providers of aged care … have to be accountable for what they have or haven't done".
"I will make known that individual nursing homes, every time there is a death, there is the potential of the coroner looking at that and that would be entirely a matter for them," he said.
Saturday was the biggest day of testing
The Premier confirmed the state had conducted a total of 1,500,592 tests and 42,573 of those were done yesterday.
"[It is] by far and away the biggest testing result that we've seen on a single day," he said.
"If memory serves, I think 37,000 was around the number that was around our previous peak.
"That is a very impressive effort and we are very grateful to each and every Victorian coming forward and getting tested.
"That is critical to tracking this virus and then being able to contain it."
More healthcare workers are getting sick
There are 381 active cases among healthcare workers which Mr Andrews called "a significant challenge".
"While we have overall capacity and we've worked very hard all throughout the year to grow the number of people that can be available for our fight against this virus in a clinical sense, whenever we have clinical staff and other critical health workers away, furloughed because they are a close contact or in fact as an active case, that does put some additional pressure on our system," Mr Andrews said.
But there is a plan to combat the demand for these workers:
- There are 200 off-roster paramedics and third-year students helping with contact tracing
- 20 ADF personnel will tomorrow work alongside Ambulance Victoria paramedics in joint crews (this will increase to 150 ADF staff over the next 10 days)
- 16,000 health workers who have expressed interest in working on the state's public health response
- There are about 4,000 current and retired nurses and midwives who have volunteered to help
- 800 extra health professionals have already been deployed
An 'impressive' number of Victorians following the rules
The Premier said it makes him "very proud to see so many people wearing masks right across the city, particularly in regional Victoria, too, where it's not compulsory".
"That's a fantastic, simple but powerful step we can take to try to curb the spread of this virus," the Premier said.
But remember — if you are sick, then you must get tested and get tested quickly.
"Then you must stay at home and wait for your test results," Mr Andrews said.
"Not going to work, not going shopping. That's all I ask of you. It is a simple thing.
"There is a $300 payment available if are you in insecure work in between getting the test and getting the results.
"If we do, together with all the other restrictions we have in place, and in particular the universal wearing of masks which the Chief Health Officer has indicated is essentially our Stage 4, that will start to see not just the stability that we seem to be enjoying at the moment, but it will start to drive down the R-nought number, the number of people that each positive case infects.
It is taking on average two days to process coronavirus tests
The average is two days. But, in some cases, it takes longer.
Remember, Victoria did more than 40,000 tests yesterday.
"We have been running close to 30,000 a day for quite some time now," Mr Andrews said.
"We get some support from private laboratories, get some support from interstate labs also. Everyone is doing their best and the average time is around two days.
"This doesn't mean that every single sample will be back within those two days, some will take a little bit longer, but that's why we've been a bit conservative and said that the $300, which we think is more than one day's pay for most people who would be in that insecure work and who would be making the decision to go to work to get paid rather than being out of pocket [will be paid].
"You've got to get tested as quickly as you possibly can, then stay at home, don't go to work, don't go shopping. We will support you in any way we can and we will get your result back as fast as we can also, but we just can't have people going to work, for whatever reason, while they've got a runny nose, scratchy throat, headache, fever, all of the warning signs that you've got this virus."
Victoria might not end its lockdown after six weeks
Mr Andrews was not about to give a yes or no answer to this.
Here's what he had to say:
"These things change rapidly, but we have to say these numbers are far too high.
"While there is some relative, and I stress the term "relative" stability, and I mean we are not seeing the doubles and doubling again which is what the modelling told us we would have been dealing with, we've got to drive these numbers down.
"While the vast majority of them can be traced back to an outbreak, even with that, if you were to reopen now, say, then we would not be dealing with hundreds of cases a day, we would just, because of movement, because of change of transmission, we would be dealing with many thousands of cases per day.
"We are approaching the halfway mark.
"We've been clear that it would get worse before it got better, but stability had to be achieved before we would start to see numbers fall.
Tackling virus outbreak remains top priority
First and foremost, Mr Andrews said he needed to support workers financially so they stopped going to work when they were sick.
He was asked about employers who might treat a worker unfairly if they take this time off and he was adamant in his response.
"Ultimately, no employer should be discriminating against anybody, least of all discriminating against someone who is doing the right thing by every colleague and by that particular business [by not coming to work]," Mr Andrews said.
"No business wants to be shut down. No business wants to be becoming particularly famous because they've got an outbreak in their particular set-up.
"[The possible discrimination] is not unimportant, but we are far, far more focused on the most pressing issue and that is trying to supplement the income, to replace the income that those families will not get because they don't have sick leave, they don't have a safety net that they can fall back on.
"If they don't work the shift, they don't get paid, but now they don't have to work the shift, they can get the $300 payment, they can get the $1,500 payment. That is direct support. That's where our focus has been.
"The broader issues thrown up as a result of insecure work, we should all come back to those, we absolutely should, because that has been exposed during this global pandemic as a really bad feature of equity and fairness right across our state."
Premier reinforces plea to wear a mask
Mr Andrews made a powerful statement when asked about a minority of people who believed their rights were being violated by being forced to wear a mask.
Here's what he had to say:
"If those directions are not followed, police are able to fine you. It is a $200 fine. It should never come to that.
"If it was a genuine error, a sense of any confusion — police use good judgement.
"But if you are just making a selfish choice that your alleged personal liberty, quoting some, I don't know, something you've read on some website — this is not about human rights.
"What's more, the nurse who will be treating you or a loved one, they will be wearing a mask, so you wear one to prevent that nurse from having to treat more patients.
"It can't get any more serious than that. Ten families are currently planning funerals. And the youngest among them, this he have lost someone in their 40s.
"Please wear a mask. Everyone! And if you don't, you will get fined. And that's exactly as it should be."
About a third of the cases are in young people aged under 30
This statistic has been a feature of the pandemic since it started.
"And it's not about blame, it's just about being as frank as you can. And all of us, regardless of our age, our gender, our postcode, our income level, whether we pray or we don't pray, none of those things matter. We're all in this together," Mr Andrews said, responding to questions about his Facebook post to young Victorians on Saturday night.
"If we're not careful, [we will get] a chain of transmission that just doesn't end.
"And you know, I want businesses to survive. I want bars to reopen. I want people back at work. I want people finding a COVID-normal. We can achieve that. But the Government can't achieve it for Victoria on its own."
Jury's out on whether the cold is making infection rates worse
There had been some international evidence that suggests that a colder climate could play a part in spreading the virus but "there are 70,000 cases a day in the United States and it's stinking hot over there at the moment", Health Minister Jenny Mikakos said.
She said she was grateful that Victorians had received their flu jab this year in huge numbers.
"We've had far greater numbers this year than we've ever seen before," she said.
"And that has actually put a downward trend on flu numbers this year.
"Usually our hospitals are saturated with influenza cases at this time of the year."
https://news.google.com/__i/rss/rd/articles/CBMiZWh0dHBzOi8vd3d3LmFiYy5uZXQuYXUvbmV3cy8yMDIwLTA3LTI2L2tleS1wb2ludHMtZGFuaWVsLWFuZHJld3MtY29yb25hdmlydXMtdmljdG9yaWEtdXBkYXRlLzEyNDkzMTYw0gEnaHR0cHM6Ly9hbXAuYWJjLm5ldC5hdS9hcnRpY2xlLzEyNDkzMTYw?oc=5
2020-07-26 06:09:00Z
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