Uh oh it’s lockdown time for us again

I agree nanna8 to go through another lockdown albeit only for 5 days we will see how many times this is extended all because of lack of control in quarantine hotels. This is the 2nd time, it would seem our government has still not learnt how to control the people in quarantine and the workers.

Tennis players and their cohorts have been allowed to come in $$$$$'s talk. Meanwhile our schools are yet again disrupted as are so many businesses. Why are tennis players considered essential workers and other businesses are not.

We are settling on a new home on Monday, fortunately the process should not be delayed but it has meant our final inspection had to be done today and only one of the owners could be there so we still have many unanswered questions to be sorted out.

Interesting to read this, as Australia is always held up as a country who has got the quarantine situation right.

On a lighter note, my DD lives in Oz. When I spoke to her recently, I told her that unfortunately, our DIL had contracted Covid, as had 10 colleagues, she works for the NHS.
DD said “Crikey, if that were over here, they would be closing state borders with that number of cases!”

DIL thankfully seems to have had it very mildly.

Don’t want to sound flippant, nanna8 but welcome to our world. My husband and I have cancelled a total of 9 holidays away over the past year, just as we think it’s ok, we book somewhere then we are back in lockdown. I will not book anything for a long time.
So sorry you are back in lockdown and just for a few elite tennis players and their entourages ?

We have had nearly a year of it , starting at the end of March 2020 so we are all really quite used to it and totally sick of it. As soon as we get on top of it they let people in who are known to be contact with it. Madness. The number of businesses who will go to the wall is huge and all because of stupidity.

I’m so sorry to hear this, nanna8. My daughter in Grovedale, Geelong, had just texted this news to me and then rang for a catch up. Their son is 12 and has just started high school but doesn’t seem to mind home schooling for a few days.

It is disappointing about your holiday but you are fortunate to have a decisive government. Here in the UK ours seem to react too slowly each time action is required, apart from with the vaccination programme which is going well. I had mine yesterday.

I hope you stay well and can rebook your holiday for another time. Take care. ?

Thanks Ashcombe. Funny enough our holiday was to be at Barwon Heads near Geelong in the caravan park there. It’s a small world isn’t it ?

Indeed it is, nanny8! I know Barwon Heads from when we stayed with my family at their previous home in Grovedale. Coincidentally, their nearest beach is at Torquay which is where I live in the UK!

Our latest lockdown comes because there are now 19 active cases in Victoria. Nothing compared to UK numbers but I do question why other Australian States have less stringent restrictions and yet have less infections.

Calendargirl there are different quarantine setups, each State runs their own and the New South Wales contact tracing seems to be good. The Victorian Govt was supposed to be following the NSW model after the last huge stuff up which saw our cases soar and peaked at 750 in Victoria in a day. However I maybe cynical but as different political parties govern in NSW and Victoria there seems to be a reluctance by our government to do what is proven to work because of politics. Personally I wish the Federal Government would take over control lock, stock and barrel.

I'm told by my brother in Victoria that it is the new strain taken in by tourists from the North East UK. Why on Earth are people still travelling?

Glad to see that the creators of rumours are just as prolific in Australia as anywhere else...

Tourists from the UK? Going to Australia? Highly unlikely I would have said. But you know, blame the Poms.

Plague hotels? That's nice.

Blame the tennis players and their entourages? Try again, it was nothing to do with them.

Maybe take a look at the quarantine hotel worker who was walking around the hotel without PPE they had been told to wear.

Sorry to hear that your holiday has been postponed. I don't know what the answer is, this virus isn't going anywhere. So the only option is to ban all travel or deal with the consequences. Is Australia self sufficient? I imagine that eventually it will be mass vaccination as a way out? Although I am starting to have doubts that about the effectiveness of that.

Isn’t this another example of how we all will have to learn to live with the virus rather than to fruitlessly try to eradicate it completely?

Unless a country is prepared to indefinitely barricade itself off from the rest of the world, cases will spring up.

Vaccination of course is the answer and we are leading the world in that respect, but outbreaks will occur until other countries have managed to vaccinate enough of their citizens.

Our problem is the Chairman and his union mates. That and sheer incompetence. I wish we had the Federal Government in charge, too. Even Gladys from New South Wales who seems to do a better job. So many things are leaking out about a failure to observe health protocols it is alarming and to use a hideous hotel like the Holiday Inn belies belief. It looks like a giant Diamond Princess to me, all windows, no fresh air and shared air conditioning. A Petrie dish.

Alegrias1

Glad to see that the creators of rumours are just as prolific in Australia as anywhere else...

Tourists from the UK? Going to Australia? Highly unlikely I would have said. But you know, blame the Poms.

Plague hotels? That's nice.

Blame the tennis players and their entourages? Try again, it was nothing to do with them.

Maybe take a look at the quarantine hotel worker who was walking around the hotel without PPE they had been told to wear.

I don't think there are any tourists from UK coming into Victoria but there are travellers coming from UK, probably Australian citizens or residents returning home and there has been people associated with the tennis that have tested positive for covid. I don't think anyone was or is blaming the "poms" at all but it is the UK strain that is identified in this new outbreak. Nor do I think anyone mentioned plague hotels however there has been major issues with quarantine hotels in Melbourne and IMO it is the responsibility of the government to sort this out so they can be effective. Yes, also IMO the people working at those hotels should be accountable for working to the relevant standard and as we both know that means wearing the necessary ppe. There should be someone making sure the workers are wearing that equipment and following all other necessary precautions. To be sure the people working as quarantine officers are maintaining the correct procedures they probably should also be housed in the hotel and not be wandering around to shopping centres and bars etc.

The phrase "plague hotel" was definitely used upthread.

Calling people "tourists", as someone did upthread, when they may have perfectly valid reasons for going to Australia, is not appropriate and makes other people think the travellers were being selfish, when we have no idea why they were travelling.

The tennis tournament is not the reason for the current 5-day lockdown, as far as I can see.

I agree with you about the management of quarantine hotels though.

Overseas people

Are these Australians returning home? I understood there was a ban on visitors, migrant workers and overseas students entering Australia?
It was also my understanding that arrivals were escorted by guards or police to a quarantine hotel.

Every breach of quarantine I have heard if is of guards at immigration hotels moonlighting in other jobs.

We are furious because we had a holiday booked and paid for setting off on Sunday along with a group of 55 others.
I'm not sure where you were heading but gatherings of more than 50 are not permitted in Queensland.

I'm glad they have shut State borders and I hope that remains so.

JenniferEccles yes, I agree

Spectators are still being allowed at the Australian Open Tennis Tournament in Melbourne according to Sky News?

keepingquiet

I'm told by my brother in Victoria that it is the new strain taken in by tourists from the North East UK. Why on Earth are people still travelling?

How odd.
It's illegal for people in the UK to travel and it is not permitted for holidaymakers to enter Australia so how did they manage to travel there and get through immigration (stringent at the best of times)?

Australia’s borders are closed. The only people who can travel to Australia are:

Australian citizens
residents
immediate family members
travellers who have been in New Zealand for the previous 14 days (not including time in managed quarantine).

We could come but we wouldn't at the moment.

Nanna8 used the phrase “plague hotel” in the initial post.

GrannyGravy13

Spectators are still being allowed at the Australian Open Tennis Tournament in Melbourne according to Sky News?

No, it was reported that spectators will be barred whilst the lockdown is on, Grannygravy

nanna8

Victoria Australia is again in hard lockdown because of the virus spread from overseas people. I really can’t understand why they let them in knowing we haven’t even got the vaccine here yet. When they arrive apparently people from interstate can just walk through with no check. Overseas people get taken to a plague hotel where they are fairly likely to catch the virus if they haven’t got it already. We are furious because we had a holiday booked and paid for setting off on Sunday along with a group of 55 others. All of us had been really looking forward to getting away after a year of being more or less isolated.

Who are the 'overseas people' - I thought only citizens and residents were allowed to enter Australia?

Would you deny your fellow citizens the right to return to their own country?

As soon as we get on top of it they let people in who are known to be contact with it.
I don't understand that.

Callistemon there were definitely spectators today, is the ban from tomorrow?