MELBOURNE (Reuters) – Victoria, Australia’s second most populous state, went into a five-day lockdown on Saturday as authorities rushed to prevent a third wave of COVID-19 cases caused by the heavily contaminated British variant .
A new locally acquired case was confirmed in the past 24 hours, health authorities said on Saturday, bringing the number of cases related to a quarantine hotel at Melbourne airport to 14 and the total number of active cases in the state to 20.
“Many people will be in pain today. This is not the position Victorians wanted to take, but I cannot have a situation where we look back in two weeks and wish we had made these decisions now, ”Victoria Premier Daniel Andrews told reporters on Saturday.
International flights to Melbourne will be halted until Wednesday, after five en route, carrying about 100 passengers, land on Saturday.
All 14 cases in the airport cluster are due to the highly contagious British variant of the new coronavirus. So far, only direct contacts of hotel employees have tested positive.
‘It is contained in that sense. There is concern in Victoria about dissemination in the community, ”Paul Kelly, Australia’s Chief Medical Officer, told reporters.
Streets in central Melbourne, the state capital, and the suburbs were nearly empty on Saturday, and people had to stay home for anything but essential groceries, two hours outside of sports, care or work that cannot be done at home.
One of the “essential” activities, playing at the Australian Open, the first Grand Slam tennis event of the year, running until February 21, continued, but fans were banned until Wednesday. Thousands had to leave midnight before midnight on Friday.
Players missed the hustle and bustle of the crowd.
“It was a bit disturbing – sad in some ways. … I was just trying to focus on my game, ”said Elina Svitolina after winning her match in the third round.
The lockdown, which has closed restaurants and cafes to everyone except take-out, hit just as Melbourne had prepared for its biggest weekend in nearly a year, with Lunar New Year celebrations, Valentine’s Day and the Australian Open crowds.
Melbourne last year underwent a 111-day lockdown, one of the strictest and longest in the world at the time, to stop a coronavirus outbreak that resulted in more than 800 deaths.
“It is the busiest weekend of the year for us. I’m sitting here making heartbreaking calls to see if I can rebook them, ”said Will Baa, owner of Lover, a restaurant in hip Windsor.
“Just fingers crossed that it only stretches for a short period of five days,” he said.
More broadly, Australia is considered one of the most successful countries in the world in tackling the pandemic, in large part because of decisive closures and sealed borders for almost all travelers except a trickle of travelers. With a population of 25 million, there have been approximately 22,200 community cases and 909 deaths.
New Zealand reported one death of a patient with COVID-19 on Saturday. That case has yet to be included in the country’s total of 25 COVID-19 deaths.
Reporting by Sonali Paul; Editing by Michael Perry / Peter Rutherford