Australia COVID LIVE updates NSW records 1218 cases and six deaths as Victoria records 92 cases
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Thanks for joining us this morning. If you’re just catching up on the news , below is a summary of the key things you may have missed:
Premier Gladys Berejiklian acknowledged the pandemic was taking a toll on people’s mental health, as emergency department visits for self-harm and suicidal ideation are up 31 per cent for children and teenagers in NSW compared with last year. She said a 70 per cent first dose vaccination rate could offer further relief for those under harshest restrictions.
Victoria recorded 92 new cases, mainly in Melbourne’s northern and western suburbs. Just 19 were isolating for their full infectious period. The state will no longer be exiting lockdown in the coming week.
Premier Daniel Andrews said there was “still a chance†of driving case numbers down. He also said he did not want “thousands of extra doses†of vaccine flowing to NSW unfairly when there was need in other states, and that he had received that guarantee from the Prime Minister.
Queensland reported one local case who was already isolating at home, and authorities announced a new mass vaccination hub to open on Brisbane’s north within weeks.
New Zealand 83 new cases of COVID-19 in the community, all but one in Auckland. It marked the country’s worst day yet in the Delta outbreak. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has hinted that the already tough level 4 restrictions could get even stronger.
There were 13 new cases in the ACT, while 41.2 per cent of the population is now fully vaccinated.
I’m Natassia Chrysanthos signing off for the afternoon - my colleagues will keep you posted for the rest of the day.
Lockdown 6.2 is hard on all of us. For me, it is only irksome, realising that I will have to cancel my planned holiday in Broome for a third time, cancelling coffee and meal catch-ups with friends, and spending most of my day in my home office.
For some though, it has meant loss of employment, closure of their businesses, exacerbation of mental illness, more exposure to domestic violence, and initiation into drugs or increased alcohol intake as coping mechanisms.
Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews.Credit:Simon Schluter
It is no wonder that some â€" even apparently some in the Victorian cabinet â€" are heeding the siren call for an early end to lockdowns at a time when just over half the total population is vaccinated, or 70 per cent of the adult population as the national plan phrases the phase B threshold.
Click here to read the story.
A man from Sydney’s south-west has shared the challenges of caring for his family members who have COVID-19.
Hussein Taha has the virus, as does his wife and young son.
Hussein Taha shares the challenges of caring for family members with COVID-19.Credit:Nine News
“She’s struggling to breathe,†he told Nine News.
“I [almost] reached death many times.“
Mr Taha said his sister is in ICU and her husband and son also have the virus.
“I don’t want to see my wife struggle, I don’t want to see my sister struggle, I don’t want to see my son struggle,†he said.
“I’m by myself, it’s very hard.“
He thinks his family contracted the virus from a couple he claims were infectious for several days without disclosing their condition.
An Echuca aged care community has been added to the Victorian exposure sites list as a tier one location for all staff and visitors from August 13-26.
Anyone who worked at or visited the Echuca Community for the Aged - Wharparilla Lodge at 21 Hartshorn Drive between August 13 at 9am on August 26 at 6pm needs to immediately get a COVID-19 test and quarantine for 14 days.
McDonalds Oakleigh South, Coles Spencer St at Docklands, Woolworths St Kilda, Chemist Warehouse, Victoria Gardens Shopping Centre and ChemMart Pharmacy in Melton are among a number of shops added to the list as tier two sites for various dates.
Tier two exposure sites require anyone who attended the venue at the stated times to immediately seek out a COVID-19 test and isolate until receiving a negative test result.
Click here for the updating list of exposure sites.
If you’re in a dilemma about dobbing in a friend who attended an anti-lockdown protest, or wondering whether to prioritise home-schooling over work, this free hotline may be of help.
But don’t expect them to tell you what to do. The 20 volunteer counsellors who answer The Ethics Centre’s Ethi-call helpline do not give advice, says director Michelle Bloom. Instead, they ask questions that 92 per cent of callers said assisted them to find a better way to think about an issue, and made 90 per cent feel better.
“It is so empowering,†said Ms Bloom. “I really love our absolute assumption and belief that the best answer and advice sits in the person themselves.â€
Click here to read the story.
UPDATED: A number of inner Melbourne shops have been added to Victoria’s exposure sites list as tier-two entries this evening including sites in St Kilda and Sunshine.
7-Eleven St Kilda has several entries where a case or cases have made short visits to the store on August 21, 22, 23, 24 and 25 while Woolworths in St Kilda and Sunshine has also been added, both on August 23.
Woolworths Fisherman’s Bend, based in Port Melbourne, has also been added on August 25 from 10.30am to 11.20am and 5.40pm to 7.10pm, August 27 6.45am to 7.25am.
The Dusty Fox at 477 Plummer Street, Port Melbourne has also been added for August 25 from 12am to 11.59pm.
Those Port Melbourne sites are also tier-two sites.
Tier two exposure sites require anyone who attended the venue at the stated times to immediately seek out a COVID-19 test and isolate until receiving a negative test result.
Click here for the updating list of exposure sites.
Earlier we reported there were 31 positive COVID-19 cases among inmates at a prison in Sydney’s north-west.
However it appears there was a mix-up.
Parklea Correctional Centre.Credit:Janie Barrett
Yesterday the private operator of Parklea Correctional Centre, MTC-Broadspectrum, said there were 12 cases among prisoners in the same wing of the jail.
This morning NSW Health’s Dr Jeremy McAnulty said there were now 31 cases linked to the prison, which was interpreted as 19 additional cases on top of yesterday’s 12 cases.
But Corrective Services NSW and MTC-Broadspectrum clarified that the outbreak remains at 12 cases, and 31 is the total number of cases recorded at the jail in the past month.
The difference of 19 is the cumulative number of cases that have tested positive during their 14-day isolation when entering the prison.
In effect, those 19 cases are like hotel quarantine cases (lower risk), whereas the 12 cases reported yesterday are akin to community transmission (higher risk).
As soon as Gunditjmara elder Alan Brown became eligible to receive the coronavirus vaccine, he rolled up his sleeves for the AstraZeneca jab. The decision to get inoculated was simple, but also steeped in this country’s dark colonial past.
“There was an introduction of measles and smallpox as part of the colonisation of our country, and then the Spanish flu pandemic hit Australia and heavily impacted on the Aboriginal community,†he said.
‘Let’s treat our people like people’: Indigenous nurses Shanaz and Naz Rind are helping to test people in Shepparton.Credit:Jason South
“There’s a sense of learning from history and not letting this virus hit us the way other diseases have.â€
Click here to read the story.
Parents of children with disabilities have complained about having vaccination appointments in Sydney cancelled.
Several parents have contacted the Herald to share their stories of frustration.
Louise Kuchel, from Sydney’s northern beaches, made an appointment on Wednesday for her 13-year-old autistic son to get vaccinated at Qudos Bank Arena on Sunday.
He has been eligible for a Pfizer dose since August 9 under the federal government’s rollout program.
On Thursday Ms Kuchel got a text message asking if her son had a qualifying underlying health condition, which she confirmed he did.
On Saturday night she got a text message reminder about the Sunday morning appointment.
She left home in time for the 10am appointment but by the time she arrived, she’d received a text message saying the appointment had been cancelled.
“I just could not believe it,†she said, noting her son was quite distressed by this point.
“We just had to turn around and leave.â€
Ms Kuchel said she would not return to the mass vaccination hub and would instead seek out an alternative way to get her son vaccinated.
“The message to us is that people with disabilities are down the bottom of the pile as usual. It’s just not right, it’s infuriating and I’m sick of it.“
New York: A Texas man who led a group of “Freedom Defenders†against mask restrictions died of COVID-19 at age 30.
Caleb Wallace left behind three children and a pregnant wife.
Texas anti-mask activist Caleb Wallace has died from COVID-19 at the age of 30, leaving behind three children and a pregnant wife. Credit:Facebook
His wife, Jessica, announced her husband’s death on a GoFundMe page on Saturday, US time, that had detailed his fight with COVID-19 the past few weeks.
“Caleb has peacefully passed on. He will forever live in our hearts and minds,†she wrote.
New York Daily News
Click here to read the story.
Queensland police have charged one man with assaulting an officer and arrested two others during a second but smaller weekend of anti-lockdown protests on the NSW border at Coolangatta.
More than 100 gathered at the protest’s peak from midday on Sunday but joint efforts from police on both sides of the border hindered organisers’ efforts to rally together in larger numbers, Acting Chief Superintendent Rhys Wildman told reporters on the Queensland side.
“Unfortunately, on our side in Queensland, we had three arrests. One of those arrests actually involved the assault upon one of our police officers, a serious assault,†he said.
“The officers … were actually trying to arrest the male due to his behaviour, and [he] actually assaulted the officers during the arrest process.â€
The 39-year-old Queensland man has also been charged with obstructing police.
Two others are expected to be fined for breaching public health directions.
Chief Superintendent Wildman said the three arrested had been among the more than 1000 involved in last Sunday’s protest and had been the subject of police investigations since and were “more agitated†than last weekend.
More than 150 police including plain clothes detectives, mounted units, the PolAir helicopter and public safety response team members were placed at the Queensland side of the large cross-border community ahead of the event, with similar numbers tasked by NSW.
The heavily intertwined community is subject to the harshest travel restrictions to date throughout the pandemic, with only a limited number of vaccinated essential workers able to cross into Queensland.
Many in the community have been urging governments on both sides of the border to find a solution to allow a border bubble to be re-established.
Footage from the scene showed many protesters not wearing masks, as some questioned their use among children.
The Liberal Democrats’ Warringah candidate, John Ruddick, posted an image of an anti-lockdown banner being flown over the region urging people to vote for his party at the next federal election.
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