Photographer: Lisa Maree Williams / Bloomberg
Photographer: Lisa Maree Williams / Bloomberg
All international travelers must return a negative Covid-19 test before boarding a flight to Australia under tightened border controls to prevent the British strain of the coronavirus from spreading.
Passengers must wear masks on all international flights to Australia and on domestic routes, and international flight crews will be tested upon arrival in the country, Prime Minister Scott Morrison told reporters on Friday after an emergency meeting of the national cabinet. The government will also reduce the number of people allowed to arrive each week, extending the task of relocating tens of thousands of Australians waiting to return home.
“This virus keeps writing its own rules, and that means we have to keep adapting to the way we keep fighting it,” he said.
Australia already has some of the strictest controls in the world, closing the border to non-residents since March, and isolating returning foreign travelers in a quarantine hotel for 14 days. The system has been critical to Australia’s success in curbing the virus, but it has also proven to be a hitch, with several instances where the virus enters the community via infected quarantine hotel cleaners, security guards or employees. charge transporting passengers from airports.
Authorities fear such breaches could increase with the more transferable UK Covid-19 variant. The state of Queensland imposed a three-day lockdown of its capital Brisbane on Friday to prevent an outbreak after a cleaner at a quarantine hotel in the city was infected with the British strain.
All quarantine workers in Australia will now be tested daily, Morrison said.
Residents in Greater Brisbane will have to stay home until Monday evenings, except for essential work, services and exercise, and wear masks when they go out, Queensland Prime Minister Annastacia Pałaszczuk told reporters Friday.
“What we’re seeing in the UK and other places around the world is high rates of infection from this particular species,” she said. “We must act immediately, we must act strongly.”
Why the mutated coronavirus in the UK is causing concern: QuickTake
Preliminary analysis suggests the variant is until 70% more transmissible than other circulating strains and contributing to a spike in UK cases. Cases have been reported in more than 30 countries, including the US, Canada, Germany, Italy, Japan, Lebanon, the Netherlands, Singapore, and South Korea.