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Sydney extends lockdown, imposes partial curfew; Covid deaths surge in SL, hospitals overflow; New Zealand extends Delta outbreak lockdown

By AFP
August 21, 2021

Wellington: New Zealand extended a national Covid-19 lockdown on Friday as case numbers continued to rise and a Delta variant outbreak spread from Auckland to the capital Wellington.

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said the initial three-day lockdown, which would have expired overnight Friday, would be extended by another four days. She said New Zealand was still trying to assess the scale of the outbreak, which emerged in Auckland this week, ending the country’s run of six months without community transmission.

"We just don’t quite know the full scale of this Delta outbreak. All in all, this tells us we need to continue to be cautious," she said. Ardern said all the cases, including those in Wellington, were linked, giving less cause for concern.

"That’s important, as it means we’re starting to build a picture of the edges of this cluster," she said. "At this stage, we don’t have random cases popping up." New Zealand has won widespread praise for its coronavirus response, which focuses on eliminating the virus in the community rather than containing it, and has seen only 26 deaths in a population of five million.

But its vaccine rollout has been less stellar, with only around 20 percent of the population fully inoculated. Neighbouring Australia has been pursuing a similar "Covid zero" strategy, but is struggling to contain outbreaks of the Delta variant.

The New Zealand outbreak has been traced back to a traveller who returned from Sydney earlier this month, although it remains unclear how the virus jumped quarantine containment into the community.

Meanwhile, Sydney extended its two-month-old lockdown for another month and introduced a partial curfew on Friday, as Australia’s largest city struggled to contain a fast-spreading coronavirus outbreak.

New South Wales premier Gladys Berejiklian announced the "difficult" decision, telling the city’s population of five million it was time to "bunker down". "Unfortunately the case numbers continue to grow," she said. "This is what life will look like for most of us until the end of September."

For much of the pandemic, Sydney saw very few virus cases. But the city is now reporting more than 600 cases each day -- straining contact tracing efforts -- and that number shows little sign of shrinking.

Stay-at-home orders will now remain in place across the city until the end of September and residents in virus hotspots will also be subject to a nighttime curfew and limited to one hour of outdoor exercise a day.

Around 1,000 defence force personnel are helping police implement restrictions, as weary residents increasingly bend the rules. With the number of deaths rising steadily and the virus spreading to regional areas, Australia is racing to get jabs in arms.

Just 30 percent of the population is currently fully vaccinated. Meanwhile, there are growing concerns about vulnerable Aboriginal communities in the New South Wales Outback, where the virus is now spreading.

The entire population of Wilcannia -- a small dusty town ringed by several ancient Aboriginal sites -- have been asked to get tested after a funeral was identified as a potential super-spreader event.

A local health department spokesman told AFP officials were going door-to-door urging locals to get tested for the virus, while a sports field has been converted into a testing site. Early in the pandemic, Wilcannia residents had put up signs on the town’s limits asking travellers not to stop - fearing the virus could obliterate an already vulnerable community.

New South Wales authorities are also facing growing anger from other Australian states, where the virus cases linked to the Sydney outbreak have emerged. In a related development, Sri Lanka announced a nationwide lockdown Friday, bowing to intense pressure from medical experts as coronavirus infections overwhelmed hospitals, morgues and crematoriums.

President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, who had resisted calls for a lockdown for weeks, agreed to the 10-day closure after dire warnings that hospitals could no longer cope with the inflow of Covid-19 patients.

"Nationwide Lockdown in effect from 10pm today to Monday (30/08)," health minister Keheliya Rambukwella said on Twitter. "All essential services will function as normal. I sincerely request all #lka citizens to adhere to the law and #StayHome."

Officials said the president was due to address the nation later on Friday night to discuss the public health emergency and measures to contain the pandemic. Supermarkets, grocery stores and fuel depots saw large crowds stocking up on supplies as news of the lockdown spread over social media.

Long queues were seen at fuel pumps across the country and energy minister Udaya Gammanpila urged consumers not to cause shortages through panic buying. The daily death toll hit a record 186 alongside a new high of 3,800 infections on Thursday with no more ICU beds available for virus victims. Official figures show 6,790 people have died of the virus while 373,165 have been infected.

However, independent health experts have said the actual toll is at least twice as much. Rambukwella said 10 days ago that the country had not reached a "critical stage" and any lockdown would be a "last resort". "But we are not there yet," Rambukwella told reporters on August 10. Since then, 1,568 people have died and 40,218 have been infected.

Junior partners in the ruling coalition and the influential Buddhist clergy had urged Rajapaksa to shut the country to contain the rapidly spreading Delta variant. A junior minister for health, Channa Jayasumana, had called the Delta strain "a powerful bomb which has exploded in Colombo and is spreading elsewhere".

Sri Lanka’s third wave of infections has been blamed on traditional Sinhala and Tamil New Year celebrations in mid-April. Following a month-long lockdown, the government reopened the country in June relying on an aggressive vaccination drive as its main strategy to deal with the spread.

Despite over five million out of the 21 million population receiving two doses of a vaccine, the virus has claimed more victims beyond the capacity of state and private sector hospitals. With bodies piling up at several state hospitals, the government resorted to mass cremations last week.