Australian authorities yesterday opened a pop-up COVID-19 testing clinic at Sydney’s Bondi Beach, as they zeroed in on specific areas that have reported clusters of infections.
Officials have stressed the need for continuing strict social distancing measures, despite a slowdown in coronavirus cases, including restricting the number of people meeting in public to just two, and closing parks, beaches and gyms.
“We can’t let our foot off the pedal, we can’t relax,” New South Wales Premier Gladys Berejiklian said in Sydney. “It doesn’t take long for things to get out of control.”
New South Wales, the nation’s most populous state, is responsible for almost half of Australia’s cases and has imposed the strictest penalties for anybody found breaching the rules restricting movement.
At Bondi Beach, health workers wearing masks and plastic gloves greeted people at the pop-up testing clinic.
LOCAL TRANSMISSION
Officials said earlier this week that the coronavirus might have been transmitted in the Bondi community via an infected backpacker, who was not aware they were infected.
“Bondi is one of those places where we are seeing local transmission and we have seen cases among backpackers in recent days,” New South Wales Director of Health Protection Jeremy McAnulty said.
Bondi last month made headlines when thousands of people were seen ignoring social distancing rules at its beach.
Official data showed that young people aged 20 to 29 account for the highest rates of coronavirus infections across Australia, followed by those in their early 60s.
Experts said that the former were most likely to travel or socialize in groups, while the latter represented the cruise-ship demographic.
The rate of growth in new infections across Australia has slowed to just under 10 percent over the past three days, from 25 to 30 percent a week ago, raising hopes that Australia is starting to “flatten the curve.”
“Whilst there are still more cases each day, we’re not seeing the scenes and the kind of growth in cases that so many other parts of the world are experiencing right now,” said Victoria Premier Daniel Andrews, who governs the nation’s second-most populous state.
The Australian government has planned for up to 100 pop-up clinics across the nation to ramp up testing in transmission hot spots.
GLOOMY VINEYARDS
In South Australia, the Barossa Valley wine region has closed schools and facilities this week due to a localized outbreak, while six baggage-handlers working at the state’s Adelaide Airport have also tested positive for COVID-19.
Barossa Mayor Bim Lange said that has put pressure on vineyards and related businesses at the height of the grape-picking season.
“We’ve had three years of drought and now this,” Lange said.
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