FINGERS are crossed across Greater Shepparton for the shortest possible state-wide ‘circuit breaker’ lockdown designed to tackle the latest failure of Melbourne’s hotel quarantine system.
The quarantine hotel slip-up saw a growing cluster spread from the Holiday Inn Melbourne Airport. As of yesterday morning, there were 25 active cases in the state.
The state was plunged into a five-day lockdown last Friday, when Premier Daniel Andrews set stage four restrictions which reintroduced the ‘four reasons to leave your home’ limits, including a 5km travel radius restriction and compulsory mask-wearing.
Meanwhile, the first 142,000 doses of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine landed in the country on Monday, with more to follow. State-wide, about 170,000 Victorians are included in the first phase of the vaccine rollout, which includes front-line healthcare workers, aged-care and disability residents and workers. Jabs are expected to start from next Monday.
President of the Shepparton Chamber of Commerce and Industry, John Anderson, summed up the feeling of the business community: “Frustration, frustration, frustration.”
“There’s a feeling that the regions didn’t need to lockdown quite so strictly,” he said.
“There was shock horror among florists and hospitality venues at the announcement on Friday, right on Chinese New Year and Valentine’s Day.”
“This just knocks confidence again. We don’t want this to keep happening and there should be a long-term plan where regions are treated differently.”
“Shepparton is close enough to Melbourne to have concerns, but it’s also far enough away to be protected by a different response.”
Concerns have been raised over Victoria’s troublesome hotel quarantine system, with a potential new site at Avalon Airport suggested by airport boss, Justin Giddings, to house returning overseas travellers rather than in metropolitan hotels.
According to statistics from respective health departments, between March 29, 2020 and February 9, 2021 Victoria has had more than five times the number of Coronavirus cases compared to New South Wales, despite quarantining significantly fewer returning travellers:
• Total travellers quarantined: Victoria 35,666; NSW 124,893
• Total cases: Victoria 20,456; NSW 4940
• Total COVID-19 deaths: Victoria 820; NSW 56
