Belated crackdown has made Victoria a pariah
The Andrews government instituted the toughest restrictions on its citizens and kept them the longest. Yet it's Victorians who are now the COVID-19 pariahs. What went wrong?
Jennifer Hewett
AFR Columnist
Jun 29, 2020 – 4.08pm
The contrast between months of Daniel Andrews’ stern rhetoric and the practical flaws now evident in Victoria’s approach is rebounding on the Premier.
Of all the states, Victoria faced the strictest and most long-lasting restrictions to try to control the spread of COVID-19. Andrews was regularly withering in his criticism about suggestions these rules should be relaxed in line with the timetable in NSW.
Even at the beginning of June, that difference was palpable. The mood in Sydney felt far more buoyant as more shops and cafes reopened, in contrast to a continuing hard shutdown in the deserted streets of Melbourne.
Yet it’s Victorians who are now regarded as pariahs nationally as the growing outbreak in Melbourne becomes the focus of community and political alarm.
That will only be fuelled by another 75 Victorian cases being reported on Monday, a record not matched since the darkest days of fear on March 31.
The growth is predictable given Victoria’s belated crackdown on suburban hotspots will take several days or even weeks to register in a falling number of infections while the increased testing and contact tracing will show up rising levels of community transmission.
It also reflects a degree of bad luck. As the various hotspots across Melbourne so dramatically demonstrate, the virus can quickly find a way through any vulnerabilities to flourish in massively escalating numbers daily.
The Victorian government was previously not persuaded by the notion of localised lockdowns or concerted testing in certain suburbs.
But what is happening is still an indictment of Victoria’s systemic failings when it came to measures to seal off potential problems emerging in particular areas.
It’s not just Victoria’s greatest source of pride – the AFL season – totally up-ended again by the Victorian debacle after the Queensland government insisted any team’s exposure to Melbourne-based teams mean quarantine will be required in Queensland.
The federal government appreciates a sustained spike in such a key economy will thwart any hopes of boosting economic growth and is also the biggest challenge to the willingness of other states to finally reopen borders. Queensland looks likely to renege on the commitment to open its borders on July 10, at least to Victorians.
Little wonder the Prime Minister insists he will offer Andrews his backing for any “strong options” the Premier might want to implement. That’s code for lockdowns of badly affected suburbs, including enforcing stay-at-home controls.
“The Premier and I are very adamant that we do what is necessary to contain this outbreak,” Scott Morrison said, while deferring to the state's authority as final arbiter.
The need to maintain unity and co-operation within national cabinet means the Prime Minister and Health Minister Greg Hunt have been reluctant to openly criticise Victoria.
Morrison also relies heavily on a good personal relationship with Andrews who, along with Gladys Berejiklian, pushed Canberra hardest for the national shutdown of much economic activity from March 22.
This certainly cemented Australia’s success in “flattening the curve” through April and early May far more effectively than originally feared.
Resentment of 'double standard'
But the Victorian version of success since has been rather more complicated – at considerable cost.
Hunt has already pointed to recent community reluctance to follow Victoria's still strict rules due to resentment of a "double standard" after thousands of Black Lives Matter protesters were allowed to gather in Melbourne three weeks ago.
Of course, NSW and Victoria were always going to be the highest-risk states, largely due to their greater number of international travellers. As Morrison and Hunt are keen to point out, localised outbreaks of such a contagious virus were also to be expected.
The key would be the ability to identify and deal with these clusters of community transmission quickly – as happened in north-west Tasmania and areas of western Sydney.
Yet the Victorian government was previously not persuaded by the notion of localised lockdowns or concerted testing in certain suburbs.
That meant its health officials never really got on top of the cluster that developed from delays in isolating the cases of infection connected to the Cedar Meats Abbattoir in Melbourne’s west.
Private security firms
At the same time, two large extended families – one of Egyptian ethnic background and one Lebanese – have since spread the virus through visiting connected households in a range of suburbs.
The Victorian government also used private security firms rather than police to manage the quarantine hotels. Breaches of appropriate checks and security protocols have translated into significant clusters among guards as well as guests in at least one hotel.
Until last weekend, the 30 per cent of travellers refusing to be retested in quarantine in Victoria also escaped any penalty.
Victorian health officials are warning the situation will “get worse before it gets better” and the Premier is instructing anyone getting a knock on the door to “take the test”.
Morrison rightly uses Victoria's experience to warn of the risks of complacency anywhere. But his examples pointedly cite Victoria-specific issues.
“You've got one outbreak that has come out of a hotel quarantine where there's been a breach there and those issues have been identified and addressed,” he said on radio.
"There was another one in a community area, which was a bit of a spillover from what had happened with the meatpacking company and some non-observance of social distancing in particular parts of a number of suburbs.”
Victoria’s Chief Medical Officer, Brett Sutton, emphasises the need to short-circuit this.
“If people are doing the right things, it doesn't matter if you have 75 [new cases of possible transmission]," he said. "But if a proportion of those people continue to go out with symptoms or to see a number of other people, maybe even just prior to having symptoms, then that is a risk of ongoing transmission."
And the certainty of ongoing economic transmission.
Posted: Mon Jun 29, 2020 5:37 pm
