Victoria’s coronavirus outbreak has jumped the border to New South Wales as the crisis in Melbourne deepens and a military operation is launched to stop people crossing the state line.
All residents of the greater Melbourne area were banned from New South Wales as of 12.01am on Tuesday – and all Victorians will be stopped from crossing the border 24 hours later.
The ban had previously only applied to residents of Melbourne’s 12 coronavirus hotspot postcodes.
Police are seen guarding commission housing flats in Flemington on Monday
Victoria’s case numbers soared on Monday for the 20th straight day of double-digit (or more) gains. The outbreak state now has more than 97 per cent of Australia’s active cases
The extension of the NSW HotSpot Order comes as the Victorian outbreak spread into the NSW town of Albury.
NSW Health confirmed on Monday night two people in the border town tested positive, one of whom had recently travelled to a Melbourne hotspot but returned before restrictions were imposed.
The Federal Government will send up to 500 military personnel to help NSW Police seal off the interstate border.
Many of the 55 road border crossings will be patrolled, while drones will spy from the air to stop people swimming across rivers or crossing through bushland.
New South Wales police officers look on as passengers arrive from a Qantas flight that flew from Melbourne at Sydney Airport to be met by health officials on Monday
Passengers from Melbourne were met by health officials on landing at Sydney Airport on Monday who took temperature. Worried by the mass covid outbreak in Melbourne, NSW has now shut its border to all Melbourne residents ahead of the Victorian border closure tonight
‘Defence is working closely with the NSW Government to finalise arrangements for the deployment of between 350 and 500 Australian Defence Force personnel to support the NSW Police Force border control checkpoints on the NSW-Victoria border,’ an ADF spokeswoman said.
‘The first of these are expected to deploy to the border to achieve the NSW Government directed border closure timings, pending finalising the agreement with NSW authorities.’
As of Monday night, Victoria had 645 active cases which make up more than 97 per cent of Australia’s total 668 active cases.
The state is to be shut off from the rest of the country after case numbers surged by 124 on Monday revised down from 127 – its highest daily increase since the start of the pandemic.
Medical staff on Monday perform a COVID-19 coronavirus test on a resident of one of nine public housing estates locked down due a spike in infection numbers in Melbourne
The previous daily high in the number of new COVID-19 cases recorded in Victoria was 111 on March 28.
Meanwhile, Victorian Health Minister Jenny Mikakos announced a 30-bed field hospital was being set up at Melbourne Showgrounds to give first aid and triage to the 3000 residents of nine public housing towers under total lockdown in Flemington and North Melbourne.
Australia’s first field hospital dedicated to the virus was jointly established by the Royal Melbourne Hospital and St John Ambulance to provide urgent care if needed, Victoria’s Department of Health and Human Services said on Monday.
Australia’s first emergency coronvirus field hospital was set up on Monday at Melbourne Showgrounds. The 30-bed triage and acute care centre is for the 3000 residents of the nine housing commission towers, locked down after a coronavirus outbreak
Melbourne passengers arriving at Sydney Airport on Monday were met by health officials who took their temperature
The public housing situation worsened on Monday with a 10th block exposed to the deadly virus.
A resident living in a locked-down North Melbourne tower also worked as a subcontractor for Victoria’s Health Department in the 10th block, at 108 Elizbeth St, Richmond, Nine News reported.
Seven levels of the building have now been sanitised but the building had not been locked down as of Monday night.
Two people tested positive to coronavirus at the New South Wales border town of Albury, NSW Health said on Monday. One of them brought the virus back from a Melbourne hotspot. New South Wales immediately shut the border to all greater Melbourne residents as of Tuesday
‘Dying of starvation’: Public housing say they’ve only eaten four sausage rolls since nine towers were forced into lockdown
Public housing residents trapped in their homes have broken down in tears as they claim food supplies are so dangerously low people could die from starvation.
Nine towers in Flemington and North Melbourne were locked down on Saturday in an effort to slow the spread of coronavirus, with 3,000 residents unable to leave their apartments for any reason for at least five days.
The state government says it has distributed 3000 meals, 1000 food hampers and 250 personal care packs to residents, while the charity FareShare has provided more than 3000 prepared meals and 4500 pastries.
But Debbie Harrison, who is caring for her 83-year-old mother, Ivy, at a housing unit in North Melbourne says they have only been given four sausage rolls to eat in 48 hours.
Debbie Harrison (pictured) broke down in tears and said she and her mother have run out of fruit, vegetables, meat and toilet paper
Debbie Harrison (right) is caring for her 83-year-old mother, Ivy (left), at a public housing unit in North Melbourne and says they have been given four sausage rolls to eat in 48 hours
Ms Harrison broke down in tears and said she and her mother have run out of fruit, vegetables, meat and toilet paper.
The distressed woman said they had only received their first delivery on Monday despite going into complete lockdown at 4pm Saturday.
The mother and daughter were given four small sausage rolls to sustain them for the entire day.
‘They are just going to go in the bin, we’re not touching them,’ Ms Harrison told A Current Affair.
Frozen meals left for residents in the public housing blocks have thawed and gone off (pictured)
Ms Harrison tried to get her daughter to deliver groceries, but she was turned away by police guarding the public housing tower.
The 83-year-old great-grandmother said she is more worried about her children and her great-grandchildren.
‘I want things to be what they used to be, I’ve never known anything like this in my 83 years, never,’ she said.
Residents of the nine towers have complained about not having enough food since the lockdown began on Saturday afternoon.
Flemington resident Steve Ulu told Nine News that nobody had knocked on his door to ask if he needed anything.
Mr Ulu said he was running low on cat food and was just lucky he had enough food in his freezer to get by when the lockdown began.
‘The prisoners have got more than we do because they get to eat three times a day,’ he said.
A resident who did not give her full name claimed that she and her seven children had been living off Weetbix cereal without milk, SBS News reported.
‘I can’t keep them fed anymore … I don’t know how to explain. I didn’t expect this,’ the resident said.
However photographs revealed police delivering pallet loads of bread and boxes of essential food to Melbourne’s housing commission towers on Monday.
Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews said on Monday that Foodbank had provided 1000 essential food hampers with cereal, pasta, long-life milk, sugar, and tinned vegetables to residents, while a further 3000 ready-made meals and 4500 pastries had also been delivered.
Melbourne community groups have also rallied to help the residents with Sikh Volunteers Australia bringing hundreds of hot vegetarian meals, Foodbank Victoria delivering 1600 hampers and the National Homeless Collective delivering 140 tins of baby formula, nappies and sanitary pads.
A 10th subsidised housing tower at 108 Elizabeth St, Richmond, Victoria, linked to the outbreak by a subcontractor. It has not been locked down but has had several floors cleaned
Despite complaints of food shortages, police could be seen on Monday delivering crates of bread at Flemington and North Melbourne’s housing commission towers
Mr Andrews said on Sunday that the Victorian Government would give residents of the subsidised housing towers food, free rent for two weeks, baby formula, pet food and medical essentials.
They will also be provided with counselling, treatment for drug and alcohol addiction including methadone for registered addicts, mental health care, family violence counselling and physical healthcare.
Translators will be doorknocking to explain directions to tenants who don’t speak English.
Some residents of the public housing estate are employed and they will receive a $1500 hardship payment to compensate for missing work.
A crowdfunding campaign for residents by Victorian Trades Hall Council has raised more than $250,000.
Subsidised housing residents protest their lockdown in Melbourne on Monday. Nobody except essential service workers is allowed in or out for the five-day lockdown which began on Saturday afternoon, until every resident is tested for coronavirus following an outbreak
A resident peers out from a window inside the Racecourse Road housing commission tower. Residents in nine towers have complained they are not getting food, however thousands of food packages have been distributed by government and community groups
However, residents on Monday complained to SBS news that the food parcels provided by the government were ‘culturally inappropriate’ including non-halal meat.
Sixteen new coronavirus cases were found at the nine towers on Monday bringing the total to 53 confirmed cases in the subsidised housing blocks.
‘The nine towers involved are now closed and residents are required to stay in their homes at all times,’ Victoria’s Department of Health and Human Services said on Monday afternoon.
‘This will be in place to ensure we can test every single resident. The lifting of this restriction will be determined by our success in testing and tracking this virus.’
Five hundred police are patrolling the towers to make sure that nobody enters or leaves except essential service personnel.
Despite media reports of claims that residents hadn’t received food, Police were photographed delivering pallet loads of bread to Melbourne’s lockdown towers on Monday
Contrary to reports that residents were not being given food, police were seen delivering boxes of basic essentials on Monday. Pictured: budget boxes delivered to Flemington’s towers
The decision to close Victoria’s border with New South Wales was made after three-way talks between Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews, NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian and Prime Minister Scott Morrison.
‘The cases have escalated significantly now,’ Mr Morrison told Radio 2GB on Monday evening.
‘We had a three way hook up earlier this morning … and agreed that now is the time for Victoria to isolate itself from the rest of the country.’
Mr Morrison said he expected there to be initial confusion and teething problems, but asked Australians to be patient.
‘(The) last time the border was closed, I think between New South Wales and Victoria was probably over 100 years ago. So … I think people will be understanding of that,’ he said.
The border closures will be enforced on the NSW side so as not to drain Victoria’s resources that are being used to fight the outbreak.
Residents of the subsidised government housing towers have complained that they are being sent ‘culturally inappropriate’ food care packages such as non-halal meat
The Prime Minister criticised those among the 10,000 residents living in Victoria’s hotspot postcodes who have refused coronavirus testing.
Mr Morrison said it was his view that they ought to be penalised however it was a matter for the state to decide.
A man in his 90s died in hospital on Sunday night, while a man in his 60s died on Monday, bringing the national pandemic death toll to 106.
Fourteen new coronavirus cases linked to the Al-Taqwa College outbreak were found on Monday, Victoria’s Department of Health and Human Services said on Monday, bringing the total number of cases linked to the outbreak to 77.
All staff and students at the school at Truganina in Melbourne’s west have been placed into isolation for contact tracing.
Seven emergency department staff at Northern Hospital Epping, Victoria, have tested positive to COVID-19 over the past five days, a spokeswoman said.
Contact tracing is underway and the emergency department is undergoing a deep clean, with all its staff being tested as a precaution.
While the emergency department remains open, there is a temporary reduction in non-urgent elective surgery and outpatient appointments to free up resources to keep the ED operating.
Visitors to the hospital have also been restricted as a precaution.
Victoria’s Chief Health Officer Brett Sutton was concerned by the spread of cases in Melbourne, saying a significant number were in suburbs near 12 hotspot postcodes, where stay-at-home orders are currently in place.
‘There’s significant spillover and so to use the bushfire analogy – there are literally spot fires adjacent to those restricted postcodes,’ he said.
On Sunday, Australia’s Acting Chief Health Medical Officer Paul Kelly described the towers as ‘vertical cruise ships’, due to their potential to spread the virus.
Mr Andrews said more cases should be expected as authorities test all 3000 residents of the towers.
Meanwhile, Victoria Police Chief Commissioner Shane Patton confirmed a 32-year-old resident of one of the towers at Flemington has been arrested for attempting to leave and biting police.
‘There is no excuse’: Gladys Berejiklian demands open borders with all states except Victoria
After closing the border to Victoria, NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian, who has consistently argued against border closures, said other states have ‘no excuse’ for excluding NSW residents.
‘I also stress to the other states, now that New South Wales has taken this decision and given where we are, there is really no excuse for any other state, apart from Victoria, to have any border closures with New South Wales,’ she said.
‘I urge all the other states of Australia, in our national interest, to think about that.
Premier Gladys Berejikian has demanded that all states and territories except Victoria open their borders with New South Wales
‘Given this move by the New South Wales Government, we now anticipate that the rest of the nation will be able to deal with each other directly without any hard border closures.’
Queensland is due to remove its hard border on 10 July except to Victorians while the Northern Territory is due to open up on the 17 July, except to residents from Melbourne hotspots.
South Australia said it would open up to eastern states on 20 July but has postponed that decision due to the Victorian outbreak.
Tasmania is targeting the 24 July but said it will ‘keep an eye’ on developments, while WA is yet to announce any relaxation of border measures.
Last month Ms Berejiklian slammed the Queensland government for refusing to open its borders to boost the economy.
Asked if she felt ‘silly’ because she was now herself shutting the NSW-VIC border she said ‘not at all’ because the situation in Victoria is ‘very different’ as it involves widespread community transmission.