Watch live: Health Minister Greg Hunt
Federal Health Minister Greg Hunt is providing a "virtual press conference" to give an update on COVID-19 using Facebook live from Canberra, where he is in quarantine before Parliament returns.
At least a dozen Victorian MPs and nine of their staffers have registered with ACT authorities to self-isolate for 14 days, so they are out in time for Parliament resuming on August 24.
The MPs who made their way to Canberra last weekend to self-isolate include Mr Hunt, Treasurer Josh Frydenberg, Urban Infrastructure Minister Alan Tudge, Education Minister Dan Tehan, Speaker Tony Smith, Senate president Scott Ryan, Liberal MP Tim Wilson, Labor MPs Julian Hill and Brendan O'Connor and Labor senator Kim Carr.
Latest updates
NSW backs federal plan to deny states funding if borders remain closed
By Lisa Visentin
NSW Tourism Minister Stuart Ayres has backed a federal proposal to deny funding assistance to states' domestic tourism sectors should they keep borders closed longer than necessary.
Mr Ayres said border restrictions limiting interstate travel should be removed "as soon as practically possible", as he endorsed the position advocated by federal Tourism Minister Simon Birmingham.
"I think Senator Birmingham's comments are perfectly reasonable, that if states are going to put border restrictions in place there is going to be a tourism consequence," Mr Ayres said.
Senator Birmingham has warned state and territory governments that they should not expect federal support for their tourism industries if they kept border closures in place beyond what was necessary to address the health risks posed by COVID-19.
Read more: NSW backs federal plan to deny states funding if borders remain closed
Chief Health Officer approves sitting of Victorian upper house, but regional MPs banned.
By Sumeyya Illanbey
Victoria's Chief Health Officer has given the upper house of the Victorian Parliament permission to sit next week, but has banned regional MPs from travelling to Spring Street.
Dozens of upper house MPs defied the advice of Professor Brett Sutton earlier this month to gather at Parliament House for several hours of debates and questions on August 4.
In a letter to the speaker of the Legislative Council, Professor Sutton said he "continued to hold the firm" MPs, and their staff, who live outside of metropolitan Melbourne should not attend Parliament.
He also recommended the number of MPs in the chamber be kept to an absolute minimum, and for parliamentary parties to consider avoiding senior leaders from being in the same enclosed space at the same time.
"Other control measures should be considered for the Chamber, such as installing perspex screens and having MPs further distanced from each other than the standard 1.5 metres given the potential for expectoration of saliva when speaking loudly or shouting," Professor Sutton said in his advice.
A message from those on the frontline
Nurses and doctors at the Alfred Hospital have sent a heartfelt video message to the public, thanking them for staying at home. "Everything you're doing out there is keeping us safe in here, so thank you," Katie, an associate nurse manager in the hospital's emergency department says.
COVID-19 information in languages other than English was never unchecked: Hunt
By Mary Ward
Federal Health Minister Greg Hunt has denied there were previously no checks done on coronavirus information produced by the Department of Health in languages other than English.
New information produced on the department's website will now be reviewed by translators once live.
"There's been a constant process; we've had advertisements in over 20 languages in fact sheets in over 60," Mr Hunt said, describing the new measures as an "additional element".
Throughout the pandemic, there have been criticisms of some of the non-English language material produced by the government, with some speakers saying the material is written in an overly academic or confusing way.
Asked a number of questions about management of Victoria's aged care outbreaks, Mr Hunt largely repeated his previous messages of the past fortnight: that he was not here to criticise the state government and that community transmission levels were the driving force of aged care cases.
Mr Hunt said, in Australia, 0.1 per cent of aged care residents succumbed to COVID-19, a figure much lower than most other developed nations.
"Every life lost is an agony and so we're going to fight for every life," he said.
The Health Minister thanked the 150,000 health workers who have now completed PPE training.
Handing over for the afternoon
What a morning.
As Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews keeps reminding us, one day isn't a pattern, but Victoria's numbers at 278 are far below their record high from last week and NSW's are still staying low.
I'm going to be handing over to Henrietta Cook for this afternoon's coverage.
Take care of yourselves and thanks for joining me!
'At the moment I won't be able to get down': Jockeys expecting to skip lucrative Melbourne spring
By James Polson
Three-time Melbourne Cup-winning jockey Glen Boss is not confident he and other NSW-based jockeys will contest Melbourne’s spring carnival this year.
Glen Boss, who won on the first Tuesday in November with Makybe Diva between 2003 and 2005, said the situation remained up in the air but with the big-money races added to the Sydney program in recent years, there is a silver lining.
‘‘Nothing’s been put to [Racing NSW boss] Peter V’landys yet or Racing Victoria at this stage because it’s changing too often,’’ Boss told Sky Racing Radio.
‘‘I think if you asked them at the moment they wouldn’t have the answer at the moment.
‘‘How I’m looking at it is I basically won’t be able to get down to Melbourne this spring unless something changes drastically because it’s certainly not going in the right direction at the moment.
‘‘If that happens to be the case we are in such a fortunate position with Racing NSW, it’s not the end of the world. If it’s going to happen for a year there’s a lot more things going on around in life at the moment that are a lot worse.
‘‘If we have to stay here and ride on Golden Eagle day which is Derby day (in Victoria) for $7.5 million, it’s not such a big deal."
'Three states, three signs of hope': Hunt says east coast is stopping the spread
By Mary Ward
Federal Health Minister Greg Hunt has said he believes the lower case numbers recorded in Victoria today indicate measures are working to control the spread of coronavirus in the state.
"We now believe, cautiously, that we have early signs of the flattening of the curve in Victoria," Mr Hunt said in a video press conference from his self-isolation accommodation in Canberra this afternoon.
The Health Minister, who appears to be self-isolating in a location with an Australian government media wall, said he was confident in the response to the pandemic which had been seen along the east coast."Three states, three signs of hope ... protection in NSW and Queensland and reduction in Victoria," he said.
Australia recorded more than 61,000 coronavirus tests in the past 24 hours. There have now been 5.1 million coronavirus tests conducted across the country.
Mr Hunt expressed his condolences to the families of the nine people – eight in Victoria and one in NSW – who died after contracting coronavirus in the past 24 hours, noting there was still sadness for many in relation to the pandemic despite the promising figures."
Nine families will be grieving ... so, there is the agony, but then there is the hope at the same time."
‘I don’t want to cause a diplomatic incident’: Victorian Deputy CHO on Russian vaccine
By Rachael Dexter
Allen Cheng, Victoria’s Deputy Chief Health Officer has weighed in on reports out of Russia this week that the country is claiming to have found the first coronavirus vaccine.
Russian President Vladimir Putin made the announcement on Tuesday, saying his own daughter had been inoculated.
Mr Cheng has given some fairly thinly veiled scepticism of the safety and efficacy of the vaccine, which was trialled on 78 people over two months.“I don't want to cause a diplomatic incident,” he said. “Seventy-eight people is a not a larger study”.
He said the Russian vaccine had only made it to stage two trials.
“That’s a long way from being shown that it actually works and can protect people.
“In other countries they might be more happy to deploy a vaccine like that,” he said.
Mr Cheng backed up estimates from other epidemiologists this week that a safe and effective vaccine would be available sometime next year.
Queensland police charge man after alleged Toowoomba hotel quarantine escape
By Matt Dennien
Queensland police have laid further charges against a man who allegedly escaped his hotel quarantine west of Brisbane in the Darling Downs on Wednesday.
The 25-year-old Toowoomba man allegedly left the hotel in the regional centre on the ninth day of his mandatory stay, before returning later that afternoon where he was arrested and charged with failing to comply with a COVID-19 public health directive.
He had previously returned a negative COVID-19 test and was cleared again overnight.
Police have launched an independent review to determine how the man was able to leave and identify any gaps in the system, though said his negative results meant he posed no risk to the broader community.
Deputy Commissioner Steve Gollschewsi said yesterday that the man had previously been charged with attempting to enter the state unlawfully and was due to appear before the Goondiwindi Magistrates Court in September.
Sydney school cluster at 20
By Mary Ward
We have just confirmed with NSW Health that the Tangara School for Girls cluster has hit 20 people, with one new case identified in today's numbers.
NSW recorded 12 new cases today. Four were linked to known cases: the Tangara case – which was a contact of an existing case – as well as two new cases linked to an existing case with no known source and an additional case linked to another existing case with no known source.
An additional three new cases today had no known source.
Five new cases were recorded in hotel quarantine.
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2020-08-13 04:43:00Z
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