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SYDNEY: Australia’s coronavirus hotspot, Victoria, reported nine deaths from the novel coronavirus in the past 24 hours and 41 cases on Monday (Sept. 7), compared with five deaths and 63 cases a day earlier.
The southeastern state on Sunday extended a lockdown on its capital Melbourne until Sept. 28, as daily infection rates had declined more slowly than expected.
Melbourne residents were due to emerge from a harsh six-week lockdown next weekend, but face continued restrictions for months to come.
“If we open up too fast then we have a very high probability that we are not really opening at all, we are just starting a third wave,” Victoria’s state prime minister Daniel Andrews said during a press conference.
“And we will go back in and out of the restrictions, in and out of the confinement, before the end of the year.”
READ: Dozens arrested in Australia during protests over COVID-19 shutdown
Australia’s second most populous state has been the epicenter of a second wave, now accounting for around 75 percent of the country’s 26,320 cases and 90 percent of its 762 deaths.
Hopes of a return to normalcy this month have been dashed, with a nightly curfew, restrictions on home visitors and a limit on traveling more than 5 km that will remain in effect until at least October 26.
Announcing the roadmap for easing restrictions, Andrews said rushing to experience a “short spell of sunshine” would likely lead to the virus spinning out of control again.
The stricter rules will be relaxed in Melbourne from September 13, with a nightly curfew starting an hour later at 9 pm, daily exercise will be increased to two hours and small “social bubbles” will be created for women. people who live alone.
Under the government’s plan, child care centers will reopen and up to five people will be able to gather outdoors starting in late September, but only if cases drop below an average of 50 per day.
The rules for people living in regional and rural Victoria will be relaxed more quickly, due to the small number of active cases in those areas.
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