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Australia will open its border with New Zealand “very soon,” Scott Morrison said.
The prime minister told Adelaide’s 5AA radio station on Thursday that New Zealanders will soon be allowed to fly to Australia without a requirement to complete a two-week quarantine, but said New Zealand is unlikely to immediately reciprocate.
“We can advance on that very soon,” he said. “That New Zealanders can travel to Australia, that’s good for Australian tourism.”
Morrison said this would also help ease pressure on the international hotel quarantine system that has meant thousands of Australians trapped abroad are unable to return.
“[It] it frees up more places for Australians to come home, ”he said.
The prime minister said South Australia and New South Wales would be the first to benefit from the new Kiwi travelers, suggesting that states that insist on quarantine for domestic travel would not be included in the bubble.
“We can’t have tourists from New Zealand come and take these quarantine places in those states,” he said.
It’s unclear if potential New Zealand tourists will be required to self-quarantine upon their return home, but a fully functional trans-Tasmanian bubble appears to be a bit far off.
Victoria’s death toll has reached 800, as the state recorded two more deaths and 15 new cases of Covid-19. The deaths Thursday were women, one in her 70s and the other in her 90s.
Although case numbers have stalled in adolescence for several days, Melbourne’s 14-day moving average continues to fall, now sitting at 15.6 and 0.3 in the Victoria region.
Seven of Thursday’s new cases were related to known outbreaks and eight were still under investigation.
On Wednesday, health officials raised the alarm in the coastal city of Anglesea after viral fragments were found in sewage. Deputy Health Director Dr. Allen Cheng confirmed that a second sewage test had shown more evidence of the virus, suggesting that a resident is (or was) infected, rather than a passing tourist.
“This could mean that there is someone with an active infection in the Anglesea area, but it could mean that there is someone who has recovered from the infection and is in Anglesea and we cannot tell the difference with the tests,” he said.
Cheng also urged anyone with mild symptoms in the Frankston suburb to get tested after a group from the Chadstone Mall spread further south.
“We have a little situation in Frankston that is related to the Chadstone cases. There have been eight cases in the fresh food part of Chadstone … There has been one case who has worked there from September 23-28, so anyone who has been in that area during that time, if they have the slightest symptoms Please come to be tested, ”he said.
The virus is understood to have spread to at least one Frankston home.
NSW recorded its sixth consecutive day without community transmission of Covid-19.
While the state recorded a locally acquired case on Thursday, New South Wales Prime Minister Gladys Berejiklian said it was a historic infection. The man in his 50s from southwest Sydney was re-examined as a pre-work assessment and found to have “traces” of Covid-19, he said.
NSW Health said that a repeat negative swab test and positive serology results showed the man had an immune response to the virus and that the case was likely acquired when the virus was circulating at low levels in southwest Sydney around July.
Two other cases were reported Thursday, but both were travelers returned from hotel quarantine. In the past nine days, the state has registered only one new locally acquired case.
Meanwhile, Berejiklian is under pressure to ease restrictions in regional areas of New South Wales, some of which have gone months without a case of coronavirus.
The main restrictions noted, specifically in hospitality, could be eased soon, but not until the end of the NSW school holidays on 12 October.
Queensland’s border restrictions also eased further on Thursday, with long lines formed at checkpoints as the Sunshine State extended its border bubble region to five additional NSW counties.
New South Wales residents living in the border region can now travel freely in Queensland, provided they carry a border pass and declare that they have not traveled to an access point in the last 14 days; this includes the rest of New South Wales and Victoria.
Queensland residents can also travel to the New South Wales border region without needing to self-quarantine upon return.
Previously there were 41 zip codes along the border, but as of 1 a. On Thursday, this was expanded to include the local government areas of Byron shire, Ballina, the City of Lismore, Richmond Valley and Glen Innes.
Queensland Police Chief Superintendent Mark Wheeler told the media that cars had been queuing since before 1 a.m.
“This is our 15th iteration of changes to border restrictions, so the public has gotten used to it … I just ask people to be patient and plan their trip accordingly,” he said.
“Of course we will see some lineups that will probably stretch hundreds of meters down the road… Right now we are seeing some delays of about 30 minutes and that’s understandable.“
Wheeler suggested it would be a “rough” first few days at the border with school vacations in both states and a long weekend increasing traffic.
