National News
Australia’s Chief Medical Officer said hotel quarantine programs in Australia should be impenetrable as the COVID-19 pandemic spreads beyond our shores. With record death rates and coronavirus infection rates soaring globally, Acting Chief Medical Officer Paul Kelly said Australia is in an enviable but sensitive situation. Saturday saw eight consecutive days of no community transmission – a statistic the country has not seen since February. Active cases are being managed across the country in hotel quarantine, with six cases recorded in New South Wales, five in Victoria, and one each in Queensland and Western Australia in the past 24 hours. The cases in Victoria marked the end of the state’s virus-free 42-day streak. Professor Kelly said he had “full confidence” in the Victorian call-tracing system now that it had been revamped and incoming international flights to Melbourne had resumed since Monday. He said the focus, although there was no vaccine, was on the durability of quarantine at the hotel. “As we focus on repatriating Australians … we have to make absolutely sure that our hotel’s quarantine system is the best it can be,” he said. Professor Kelly said that although the US, UK and Canada have granted emergency clearance for the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, Australia will not. Professor Kelly said, “We don’t need any vaccine this year.” Other countries are in a very different situation than us and should be given priority. ”Australia will wait for the National Therapeutic Goods Management regulator to work through its own approvals for the Pfizer vaccine with an expected distribution in early 2021. The government has already purchased 10 million doses of Pfizer vaccine, while it has purchased An additional 20 million doses of AstraZeneca vaccine and 11 million more Novavax have been requested to increase supplies after abandoning the University of Queensland vaccine effort CSL. Mark Butler of Labor said Saturday that the world’s best practice is to invest in five or six vaccines and encouraged the Morrison government to “Do more.” Butler said: “With the loss of the University of Queensland option that has not proven to be safe and effective, our number has now decreased to three.” Meanwhile, five former prime ministers have offered to be among the first to be vaccinated against the virus when the time is right. Professor Kelly expressed doubts whether they would be the first in line, and said that the priority groups would be people at high risk of infection and at high risk of exposure and health workers on A-lines. Front end. Australian Associated Press
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Australia’s Chief Medical Officer said hotel quarantine programs in Australia should be impenetrable as the COVID-19 pandemic spreads beyond our shores.
With record death rates and coronavirus infection rates soaring globally, Acting Chief Medical Officer Paul Kelly said Australia is in an enviable but sensitive situation.
Saturday saw eight consecutive days of no community transmission – a statistic the country has not seen since February.
Active cases are being managed across the country in hotel quarantine, with six cases recorded in New South Wales, five in Victoria, and one each in Queensland and Western Australia in the past 24 hours.
The cases in Victoria marked the end of the state’s virus-free 42-day streak.
Professor Kelly said he had “full confidence” in the Victorian call-tracing system now that it had been revamped and incoming international flights to Melbourne had resumed since Monday.
He said the focus, although there was no vaccine, was on the durability of quarantine at the hotel.
“As we focus on repatriating Australians … we have to make absolutely sure that our hotel’s quarantine system is the best it can be,” he said.
Professor Kelly said that although the US, UK and Canada have granted emergency clearance for the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, Australia will not.
Professor Kelly said, “We don’t need any vaccine this year.”
Other countries are in a very different situation from us and they should be given priority. “
Australia will wait for the national regulator, the Therapeutic Goods Administration, to work through its own approvals for the Pfizer vaccine with distribution expected in early 2021.
The government pre-purchased 10 million doses of the Pfizer vaccine, while an additional 20 million doses of AstraZeneca and 11 million Novavax were ordered to boost supplies after the University of Queensland-CSL vaccine effort was abandoned.
Labor’s Mark Butler said on Saturday that it was best practice in the world to invest in five or six vaccines and encouraged the Morrison government to “do more.”
“With the loss of the University of Queensland option, which has not proven to be safe and effective, our number has now decreased to three,” Butler said.
Meanwhile, five former prime ministers have offered to be among the first to be vaccinated against the virus when the time is right, to encourage the public to take it up.
Professor Kelly expressed doubts whether they would be ranked first in the line.
He said the priority groups would be people at high risk of infection and at high risk of exposure, and frontline health workers.
Australian Associated Press
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