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Today’s headlines at a glance
By Angus Thompson
Thank you for following our live coverage of today’s events. I’m handing over to my colleague David Estcourt, who will take you through the rest of the afternoon. If you’re just tuning in, here’s a snapshot of the headlines below:
- NSW has recorded 1035 locally acquired cases up to 8pm last night. Two people have died in hospital due to COVID-19: a woman in her 70s died at Nepean Hospital and a woman in her 80s at Westmead Hospital. Victoria has recorded 64 new locally acquired cases.
- Victorian health authorities are still trying to decipher the source of 41 mystery cases in the current outbreak. There are now 701 active cases across Victoria.
- NSW Health Minister Brad Hazzard said that as Friday this coming week, couples who wish to marry will be able to with a maximum of five guests allowed to attend, “in addition to those obviously necessary for the actual service”. Mr Hazzard said the fine print would be ironed out in the coming days.
- Australia’s deputy chief medical officer Professor Michael Kidd told a press conference this afternoon the Commonwealth was working with states and territories who wished to roll out school-based vaccination programs for adolescents, with 12 to 15-year-olds eligible from mid-September.
The Biden administration is bracing for more terror attacks in Kabul after the US President’s top national security advisers told him to expect more bloodshed before the withdrawal of all US troops next week. The Pentagon revealed there had only been one suicide bombing outside the airport in Kabul on Friday (AEST) rather than two as it had originally stated.
New Port Melbourne cluster a concern: Weimar
By Daniella Miletic
Victoria’s COVID-19 response commander Jeroen Weimar said of the 64 new local COVID-19 cases recorded in Victoria, four were in the inner-city suburb of Port Melbourne.
Jeroen WeimarCredit:Eddie Jim
Just before the state’s press conference started, more than a dozen mentions over several days identified Prestige Hand Car Wash and Auto Mega Warehouse in Plummer Street as close contact exposure sites, all in the same industrial pocket of the suburb.
He said the four cases were linked, so far only geographically, to this Plummer Street area, which includes a newly-opened Woolworths store.
He called for people who have used facilities in that street, such as the car detailing facility and Woolworths, to come forward and get tested.
‘Many caught out’: Shepparton stretched thin as outbreak grows
By Benjamin Preiss
A takeaway coffee from a Shepparton cafe was all it took to send Amy DePaola into quarantine for 10 days. Had she arrived 10 minutes later, she might have been spared.
“That sent the entire family into lockdown,” she said.
The DePaola family isolating in Shepparton: Mark, Amy, Tom, Alex and Zoe.Credit:Justin McManus
But with exposure sites in Shepparton surging past 125, there’s every chance one of her five family members might have visited a tier-one location anyway.
Despite the stress of quarantining, Ms DePaola considers herself lucky.
“As well as stress it’s mixed with gratitude for what we have,” she said. “We’ve got a good home with heating and reasonably stocked pantry.”
She said other families who struggle to afford food and essentials are not as fortunate.
This week Shepparton, which is 190 kilometres north of Melbourne, became Victoria’s fastest-growing coronavirus outbreak as confirmed cases climbed to 79 on Friday.
As infections rose during the week in the city of about 70,000, informal support systems began to deteriorate as more residents were required to isolate and people were unable to rely on each other for food deliveries.
One new case in NT in international traveller
NT health authorities have recorded one new COVID-19 case in the past 24 hours.
The 60-year-old male arrived on a flight from Dili, in East Timor, on August 25.
He currently has mild symptoms and is under the care of NT Health at the NT Centre for National Resilience.
The total number of cases diagnosed in the Northern Territory is 203. There are currently three active cases in quarantine in the Northern Territory.
Tired of exercising in parks and walking trails? Why not try a cemetery
So the local streets have become mind-numbingly familiar, walking trails are too crowded for comfort and the dog park is well, feral.
But if there’s one place guaranteed to be mostly dead quiet in a pandemic it’s an old cemetery.
The Melbourne General Cemetery.Credit:Chris Hopkins
Traveller have outlined Melbourne and Sydney’s best cemetery walks to escape the parks, gardens and bay shores packed with people getting their exercise with a stroll.
In Melbourne, it’s worth checking out the General Cemetery, with its entrance off College Crescent in Parkville. Its quiet curving laneways, winding between a forest of Victorian-era memorial pillars, were trodden by only a few when our reporter visited on Thursday afternoon.
In Sydney, these often nature-filled pockets of peace can offer locked-down citizens socially-distanced solitude - from Waverley with its clifftop angels and pounding surf, to St Stephen’s in Newtown with its twisty Moreton Bay fig and graffitied walls.
You can find the Sydney guide here, and the Melbourne guide here.
Today’s headlines at a glance
By Angus Thompson
Thank you for following our live coverage of today’s events. I’m handing over to my colleague David Estcourt, who will take you through the rest of the afternoon. If you’re just tuning in, here’s a snapshot of the headlines below:
- NSW has recorded 1035 locally acquired cases up to 8pm last night. Two people have died in hospital due to COVID-19: a woman in her 70s died at Nepean Hospital and a woman in her 80s at Westmead Hospital. Victoria has recorded 64 new locally acquired cases.
- Victorian health authorities are still trying to decipher the source of 41 mystery cases in the current outbreak. There are now 701 active cases across Victoria.
- NSW Health Minister Brad Hazzard said that as Friday this coming week, couples who wish to marry will be able to with a maximum of five guests allowed to attend, “in addition to those obviously necessary for the actual service”. Mr Hazzard said the fine print would be ironed out in the coming days.
- Australia’s deputy chief medical officer Professor Michael Kidd told a press conference this afternoon the Commonwealth was working with states and territories who wished to roll out school-based vaccination programs for adolescents, with 12 to 15-year-olds eligible from mid-September.
The Biden administration is bracing for more terror attacks in Kabul after the US President’s top national security advisers told him to expect more bloodshed before the withdrawal of all US troops next week. The Pentagon revealed there had only been one suicide bombing outside the airport in Kabul on Friday (AEST) rather than two as it had originally stated.
COVID-19 case visited Melbourne car wash seven days in a row
By Ashleigh McMillan
An auto shop and car wash in Port Melbourne, south of the CBD, has been listed as an exposure site of concern, after a positive COVID-19 case visited the site for seven days in a row.
There had been 29 exposure sites added to the Victorian health department’s website so far on Saturday, across suburbs like Port Melbourne, Altona North, Croydon, Croydon South, Lilydale, Broadmeadows, Footscray, Truganina and Williamstown.
New tier-1 exposure sites, which require all attendees to isolate for 14 days and get tested, include the Auto Mega Warehouse and the Prestige Hand Carwash on the same lot between August 21 and August 28.
The Sargon House of Coffee in Port Melbourne has been listed as a tier-2 site, with attendees required to get tested and isolate until they receive a negative result.
At a press conference earlier today, COVID-19 response commander Jeroen Weimar noted the four cases in Port Melbourne were linked, so far only geographically, to the Plummer Street area where the auto shop stands, which includes a newly-opened Woolworths store.
The full list of exposure sites can be found here
Commonwealth discussing school-based vaccine programs with states and territories
By Angus Thompson
Australia’s deputy chief health officer Michael Kidd says the Therapeutic Goods Administration is considering the use of the Moderna vaccine in 12 to 17-year-olds as a priority group, with a decision expected to be made in the coming weeks.
Professor Kidd also told a press conference this afternoon the national vaccine rollout coordinator Lieutenant General John Frewen was working with the Commonwealth and states and territories who wished to roll out school-based vaccination programs for adolescents, with 12 to 15-year-olds eligible from mid-September.
Deputy Chief Medical Officer Michael Kidd. Credit:Dominic Lorrimer
“While the severity of COVID-19 is less among adolescents compared with adults, infection rates among adolescents and adults do now appear to be similar,” Professor Kidd said.
“And it is also noted that potential new variants of concern may also pose a greater risk to non-immune children and adolescents in the future.
And ATAGI (Australian Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation) has noted that vaccinating 12 to 15-year-olds would deliver additional benefits through reduced disruption to schooling, sports and other organised activities.
He also said that while the focus was on the initial vaccine rollout, the Australian government was making arrangements to have booster doses made available for the general population “should they be required next year”, given the changing nature of the virus.
NSW approach not something to aspire to, Victorian Health Minister says
By Ashleigh McMillan
Victoria’s Health Minister said the approach of NSW was not something he would aspire to, as he would not want to see the Victorian healthcare system under “that amount of pressure”.
Martin Foley said he believes the zero COVID-19 cases enjoyed by other Australian states was “valuable to protect”, with the ACT and Victoria working to be able to get back to that level.
Victorian Minister for Health Martin Foley.Credit:Eddie JIm
He said from experience in his portfolio, he saw that the NSW health system was “under huge strain” with hundreds of cases in hospital, and that was not something he was willing to see in Victoria.
Mr Foley said he believed that if NSW’s leadership had their time again, “they might well have gone harder and earlier at the start of their outbreak”.
“I would not be putting the Victorian healthcare system under that amount of pressure, because all those cases mean your car accidents, your stroke victims, your heart attacks, your chronic illnesses are not in intensive care, because those beds are taken up by others,” he said.
“What is at stake here is not just weddings, and social events. It’s life and death decisions that keep our health system operating at a level that Victorians would want to achieve.
“I’m not sure 1000 cases a day is a sign of hope … I’m pretty sure that if you ask those intensive care nurses in Sydney hospitals at the moment how they saw the situation, it wouldn’t be a hugely rosy picture.”
Victoria still committed to suppressing case numbers, head of COVID-19 response says
By Ashleigh McMillan
Victorian health authorities are still committed to suppressing case numbers enough to end lockdown well before the state reaches the national vaccination targets for reopening.
COVID-19 response commander Jeroen Weimar said that the greatest achievement Victoria has made over the last three weeks of lockdown is that the “place hasn’t exploded”.
“You know we have seen a really strong robust control over these outbreaks, and we’ve seen from other places around the world just how quickly these things can gather steam,” he said.
“If we can get this outbreak down, if we can get those mystery cases eradicated, if we can get every (new case) into quarantine, that gives us options to ease restrictions to do other things.
“I’m absolutely convinced that if we continue to see the response we’re seeing on the ground that we have an opportunity to run this to ground.”
Victorian case numbers fuelled by community transmission in Melbourne’s north and west
By Ashleigh McMillan
Back to Victoria, where health authorities say that while some major clusters have clear connections between cases, community transmission cases in the north and western suburbs of Melbourne continue to fuel case numbers.
COVID-19 response commander Jeroen Weimar said the Shepparton outbreak continued to be “very significant”, with over 9000 primary close contacts. Around 83 per cent of primary close contacts to that cluster have since tested negative.
Defence Force members doing Covid-19 tests at the Shepparton showgrounds in central Victoria.Credit:Justin McManus
There are 88 residents in the Wharparilla Lodge in Echuca - which is connected to the Shepparton outbreak through a positive aged care worker - with around 92 per cent of those having received at least one jab. There were no new cases connected to the Royal Melbourne Hospital.
Mr Weimar also noted concern about the large cluster in Broadmeadows which is connected to a MyCentre Child Care and continues to have new cases emerge, which now stands at 102 active cases.
But he said while cases in the north and western suburbs continue to pop up, the outbreak were “grumbling along” but not causing super-spreader events.
“Shepparton is starting to look like a very, very clear shape ... we understand the linkages, it is all part of one significant cluster and there’s been a phenomenal response from the wider Shepparton and Golden Valley community,” he said.
“We’re not seeing huge problems, but what we do have - a particularly in those inner suburbs - is because you’ve got multiple chains of transmission there’s always a risk of something bleeding around somewhere that you haven’t got control over.
“I heard again last night from a young mother who described how her child had picked up COVID from the (Broadmeadows) childcare center, through no fault of their own, and how rapidly it’s spread through her household and the implications, the discomfort and the real distress the child went through.”
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2021-08-28 06:15:17Z
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