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(CNN) – Australia will establish a travel corridor with New Zealand to allow it, but there is a catch.
The quarantine-free travel will initially be one-way only, from New Zealand to Australia, and a limited number of destinations will be included in the deal, according to Australian Deputy Prime Minister Michael McCormack.
At a press conference in Canberra on Friday, McCormack said Australian states and territories that follow Commonwealth-approved travel restrictions could be included in the new agreements.
For now, the travel bubble will include only New South Wales and the Northern Territory. It will start at 12:01 on Friday, October 16.
McCormack said New Zealanders who have not been to a coronavirus hotspot in the previous 14 days would be allowed to enter Australia without having to isolate themselves. Under existing rules, anyone flying to Australia must undergo a 14-day mandatory quarantine at the hotel, at your own expense.
“This is the first stage of what we hope to see as a trans-Tasman bubble between the two countries, not just that state and that territory,” McCormack said.
“I just got off the phone from the Chief Minister (of the Northern Territory) (Michael) Gunner, who says the fish are biting and the beers are cold. And he wants to see as many of his New Zealand cousins and friends as possible.
Australian politicians seem more in love with the idea than those on the other side of Tasmania.
New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said on Friday that New Zealanders who accept the Australian offer will still have to self-quarantine upon their return.
“We will not open the borders to travel without quarantine with Australia until it is safe to do so because doing so too soon risks losing all the freedoms that we already have in our economy,” he said.
Ardern said it was a safety issue and encouraged New Zealanders to “spend their dollars here locally.”
New Zealand has one of the lowest rates of coronavirus infections in the world, with just 1,848 confirmed cases overall, while Australia is still working to control an outbreak in its second-largest city, Melbourne. Discussions about a possible travel bubble have been ongoing since at least May.
McCormack said the Australian Department of Health had determined that New Zealand had a “low risk” of transmission of Covid-19 to Australia.
The Deputy Prime Minister said this new travel bubble will free up space for nearly 325 passengers a week to quarantine in Sydney so that more Australians abroad can return home. For months, the Australian government has imposed limits on the number of citizens allowed to fly into the country to ease pressure on the hotel quarantine system. Thousands are still trapped abroad.
Right now, New Zealand’s borders are closed to international travelers under restrictions put in place to limit the spread of the coronavirus. McCormack said it would be up to Ardern to decide whether to make exceptions for the Australians.
“If (New Zealand Prime Minister) Jacinda Ardern … wants Australians to go to New Zealand, then it will be up to her and New Zealand how those agreements can be implemented and under what conditions,” McCormack said.
Under the Commonwealth coronavirus hotspot system, developed by Acting Australian Health Director Paul Kelly, a city is considered a ‘COVID-19 hotspot’ if it has an average of 10 locally acquired coronavirus cases during three days, or at least 30 cases over three consecutive days.
For rural or regional areas, the number is lower: a three-day average of three locally acquired coronavirus cases, or nine cases over three days.
McCormack said South Australia is likely the next state to join the definition, although he could not confirm this.
This story was first published on CNN.com “The travel bubble between Australia and New Zealand is finally here, but for now it is only one way”
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