Melbourne placed under stage 4 coronavirus lockdown, stage 3 for rest of Victoria as state of disaster declared

Authored by abc.net.au and submitted by AcornAl

Sweeping new restrictions, including a night-time curfew, have been imposed across Melbourne under stage four restrictions and regional Victoria will move to stage three restrictions from Thursday.

Key points: A state of disaster will be enforced alongside the current state of emergency

A state of disaster will be enforced alongside the current state of emergency The new restrictions will last until mid-September for all of the state

The new restrictions will last until mid-September for all of the state Exercise and shopping will be limited to within 5km of the home and all school students will return to at-home learning

Premier Daniel Andrews said 671 new coronavirus cases had been detected since Saturday, with 6,322 infections now active in the state.

Seven people have died from coronavirus in Victoria in the last 24 hours, taking the state's death toll to 123. Six of the seven cases are linked to aged care outbreaks.

There are now 385 people in Victorian hospitals, 38 of whom are in intensive care.

The state's aged care outbreak has now grown to 1,083 active cases.

The Premier said there was an "unacceptably high" number of community transmission cases, and the state had 760 active COVID-19 infections where the source of the transmission was not known.

"Those mysteries, that community transmission, is in many respects our biggest challenge and the reason why we need to move to a different set of rules," he said.

From 6:00pm Sunday, a state of disaster has been declared across Victoria, which will act in addition to the state of emergency.

Further restrictions targeting workplaces will be announced on Monday.

Residents of Metropolitan Melbourne and the Mitchell Shire are almost halfway through what was meant to be a six-week lockdown under stage three stay-at-home orders.

Mr Andrews said the current strategy undertaken by the Government so far had avoided "thousands of thousands" of cases from overwhelming hospitals, but it was "not working fast enough".

He said after much detailed analysis, the state's health experts told him the current strategy would not see the state reach a point where it could reopen until the end of the year.

"Therefore we have to do more and we have to do more right now," he said.

Melbourne is now under stage four restrictions, while the rest of the state will return to stage three restrictions from Thursday. ( ABC News )

Curfew and limits on exercising, shopping for Melbourne

An evening curfew will be implemented across Melbourne from 8:00pm to 5:00am every day, which started Sunday night, forbidding anyone from leaving the home except for working, receiving or giving care.

Under the stage four restrictions, Melbourne residents will only be allowed to shop and exercise within 5 kilometres of their homes.

Supermarkets will remain open for trading hours of their choice, but Mr Andrews said shopping should happen outside of the curfew hours.

Only one person from each household will be able to shop at a time, once a day.

"I want to assure all Victorians supermarkets, the butcher, the baker, food, beverage, groceries, those types of settings, there will be no impact there," he said.

Large queues formed at supermarkets on Sunday morning as speculation about the new restrictions circulated.

For those under the stage four restrictions, exercise outside of the home will only be allowed for one hour at a time and recreational activities like golf and fishing will be banned.

Restaurants and cafes may continue to offer takeaway and home delivery, and bottle shops will remain open.

The Premier said public transport timetables would be reduced to "a fraction" of what they were now.

People are still allowed to visit their intimate partners, even if they live more than 5 km apart.

Weddings are banned within Melbourne except on compassionate grounds.

Rules for funerals remain unchanged, allowing 10 mourners plus those conducting ceremony. Leaving home for a funeral will be allowed under the rules.

All students across the state will return to home-based learning and childcare centres will be closed.

Regional Victoria placed under stage three restrictions

Regional Victoria will move to stage three restrictions from Thursday, meaning restaurants, cafes, bars and gyms will close from 11:59pm on Wednesday.

"That is not the position we wanted to be in but we cannot have a situation where this continues to grow and grow in regional Victoria," Mr Andrews said.

The Premier said this was important to prevent a situation where the virus transmission was driven down in metropolitan Melbourne but continued to grow in regional parts of the state.

The Mitchell Shire, north of Melbourne, will join the rest of regional Victoria and stay on the same stage three restrictions it has been on for nearly three weeks.

The new restrictions will last until at least September 13 for all of Victoria.

Victorians face on-the-spot fines of more than $1,600 for breaching stay-at-home orders. ( ABC News: Chris Le Page )

Mr Andrews said he knew some regional Victorian communities with few cases would be concerned about the restrictions.

"I'm not going to let this get into aged care in regional Victoria the way that it has into aged care in Melbourne," he said.

COVID-19 testing is conducted in Broadmeadows, Melbourne, Sunday, June 28, 2020. Victoria has set up virus testing stations in neighbourhoods as it battles community transmission. ( AAP: David Crosling )

Stay up-to-date on the coronavirus outbreak Download the ABC News app and subscribe to our range of news alerts for the latest on how the pandemic is impacting the world

Return to remote learning for most students

From Wednesday, flexible and remote learning will be brought in for every student across Victoria. This includes VCE students, who had been learning on campus.

Monday will be a normal school day and Tuesday will be a pupil-free day before the new rules come into effect.

Specialist schools will remain open and students of parents who are working will have the option to go to school and be supervised.

Space to play or pause, M to mute, left and right arrows to seek, up and down arrows for volume. Watch Duration: 2 minutes 51 seconds 2 m 51 s All Victorian students will return to an at-home-learning format.

Education Minister James Merlino said regional VCE students would be learning remotely in an attempt to provide a "level playing field" for end-of-year exams across the state.

The General Assessment Test (GAT), which is usually held at the end of Term 3, will now be moved to the start of Term 4.

Mr Merlino said he wanted to assure students and families they would receive their ATAR score and VCE and VCAL certificates by the end of the year.

"We will be in step with every single state and territory," he said.

"Students across the country, including in Victoria, will receive their ATAR in that [same] window."

State of disaster grants police broader powers

Mr Andrews said the state of disaster gave police greater power and allowed authorities to suspend acts of Parliament.

Police Minister Lisa Neville said the state of disaster was decided on to make sure the Government had clear power to impose and enforce a curfew.

She said it would help police to enforce the curfew and suggested it would enable them to prevent all protests or move along crowds at settings like supermarkets if physical-distancing rules were not being followed.

Ms Neville said the legislation allowed her to appoint police as authorised officers, removing the current need for police to have a health department official with them on jobs like compliance checks.

Lockdown 'will fail' if people don't follow rules, CHO says

Defence force officers have been brought in to help with police enforcement of the state's restrictions. ( ABC News: Chris Le Page )

Chief Health Officer Brett Sutton said he hoped the "broad and deep" measures would have a "significant" impact on transmission.

"It will fail if a proportion of the population don't take it seriously, or if we think that it's just for a couple of days but not for the next six weeks in full," Professor Sutton said.

"We know that stage three worked in the sense that the curve was genuinely flattening," he said, adding around 20,000 cases were estimated to have been prevented through those restrictions.

But he said the current trajectory was "intolerable".

He said people aged between 15 and 40 made up roughly 53 per cent of cases, which had reduced the burden on intensive care units so far, compared to a scenario in which a greater proportion of older Victorians were infected.

"But the huge numbers that we're seeing week in, week out will still show up in our health system," he said.

Professor Sutton said he hoped Victoria might be past the peak, but would be about seven days before the effect of interventions announced on Sunday would be felt.

More announcements to come on workplaces

Mr Andrews said the changes being announced on Sunday were about how Victorians lived their lives, but more changes would be announced on Monday about restrictions on workplaces.

He said there would be three categories of industries — some would continue to operate as normal, some businesses would have reduced output and therefore have fewer hours and staff, while others would close completely.

He said deciding which businesses were reduced was "quite a complex task" given Victoria had the biggest container port in the country.

"There are very detailed supply chains, there is a good deal of complexity to this issue, it is better to take a little bit longer to get it right," he said.

Changes to workplaces will not come into effect until Wednesday at the earliest, so there is "a little bit more time" to consult and try to get the restrictions right, he said.

bimlpd on August 2nd, 2020 at 05:07 UTC »

If 6 weeks of these new restrictions isn't enough to get these numbers down, then we are screwed. To think it's only been 3.5 weeks of stage 3 so far. It has felt like forever.

Remindme! 6 weeks.

DiseaseMonk on August 2nd, 2020 at 04:52 UTC »

Dang... gonna have to cancel my 1am golf game...

AcornAl on August 2nd, 2020 at 04:45 UTC »

The official press release: Premier's Statement on changes to Melbourne’s restrictions

https://www.dhhs.vic.gov.au/updates/coronavirus-covid-19/premiers-statement-changes-melbournes-restrictions

These changes will be in place for at least the next six weeks until Sunday 13 September.

Of course, there’ll be some common-sense exceptions. If your closest supermarket is further than five kilometres, you can still shop there. If you’re a parent with little ones, you can still take them with you when you go for a walk.

Premier's statement on changes to regional restrictions

https://www.dhhs.vic.gov.au/updates/coronavirus-covid-19/premiers-statement-changes-regional-restrictions

And from 11:59pm on Wednesday, regional Victoria will return to Stage 3 “Stay at Home” restrictions.

Businesses in regional Victoria will also return to Stage 3 restrictions.

According to the ABC

The Mitchell Shire, north of Melbourne, will join the rest of regional Victoria and stay on the same stage three restrictions

From the ABC live feed.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-08-02/coronavirus-australia-live-news-covid19-latest-victoria/12515596

There will be a night time curfew will be implemented across Melbourne from 8:00pm to 5:00am from tonight.Melbourne residents will only be allowed to shop and exercise within 5km of their home.All students across the state will return to home-based learning. **Childcare will be closed.**Takeaway is allowed to be continued.Regional Victoria will move to stage 3 restrictions from Thursday

'State of disaster' declared from 6:00pm tonight

Police will have extra powers. This will be in addition to the state of emergency already in effect. "The current rules have avoided thousands and thousands of cases each day and then thousands of people in hospital and many more tragedies than we have seen. "But it is not working fast enough. "And there's a number of different reasons for that. "But after a lot of hard work and detailed analysis, our public health experts, as well as them speaking with their federal counterparts and I'm sure interstate colleagues as well, they have provided advice to me that says if we were to pursue this strategy with a view to driving down numbers to a very low containable level where we could reopen, it would likely be the end of the year before we were able to reopen. "That's a 6-month strategy that is simply not going to work. Therefore we have to do more and do more right now."

Within Melbourne, you will no longer be able to leave home and go any further than a 5 kilometre radius

And the Victorian Premier adds: "You will not be able to at any point [go] more than 5km from your home for the purposes of shopping for what you need."

So, that means:

Only one person will be able to go shopping, once per day Recreational activity is no longer allowed You only will have one hour of exercise, no further from their homes 

More restrictions on workplaces will be announced tomorrow.

Some more clarification on these rules

Intimate partner visits will be allowed outside of the 5km radius of your home.

Weddings will be banned from Thursday.

Funerals are allowed but 10 mourners only can leave Melbourne to attend one in regional Victoria.

There will be restricted overnight train services.

Schools

From Wednesday, Victorian schools will move to "flexible and remote learning for all students in all schools right across the state".

Year 11 and 12 students in metropolitan Melbourne will go back to studying from home.

Special schools will remain open for "those who really need it to be in those settings".

The children of parents who are working will be able to go to school and be supervised but the Premier says "it will only really be those that are absolutely necessary to do so."

"We'll be reducing the total amount of students that are at school and therefore the total amount of movement."

Tomorrow will be school as usual.

Tuesday will be a pupil-free day.

Wednesday will be home-based learning.