Victoria's COVID-19 restrictions on pubs, restaurants to be eased further
Victoria has recorded nine more coronavirus cases in the past 24 hours, five of which are linked to a doctor who worked at three Melbourne clinics, Premier Daniel Andrews has said.
Despite the increase in cases, the government will persist with plans to further ease restrictions from midnight next Sunday, with pubs and restaurants set to be able to have 50 people in each enclosed space, Mr Andrews confirmed.
Mr Andrews made the announcement on Sunday morning. Credit:Joe Armao
He said patrons would be able to order alcohol from those establishments without buying a meal, as they must currently, although table service wouldremain.
Shared camping facilities, swimming pools and sport centres are among other places that will re-open from next Sunday.
"Again, thank you to every Victorian for the contribution you have made and continue to make," Mr Andrews said. "That's why we have numbers that are the envy of the world, and avoided so many of those terrible scenes that are not over."
Victorian authorities have now tested almost 600,000 people for coronavirus, a rate of 8913 people tested per 100,000 residents.
Chief Health Officer Dr Brett Sutton said three of the nine new cases were return travellers in hotel quarantine, while five were close family contacts of a GP who had recently tested positive, and one was under investigation.
On Saturday authorities announced that a doctor who had worked in three clinics across Melbourne - in Lilydale, Croydon and Coburg - had contracted coronavirus.
Dr Sutton also announced a timeline for the return of community sport. From June 22, all non-contact sport for adults will resume, while children under 18 can resume full contact training.
Hesaid he hoped that from July 13, adults could return to full contact training and from July 20 adults could begin to play contact sports.
"We think children are less likely to transmit to others so in the same where the kids are coming together at school and don't have the kind of physical distancing that we are able to maintain and recommend for everyone else," he said. "Kids' sport is in that same category and the risk of transmission is lower."
Health Minister Jenny Mikakos said the state's testing strategy would be tweaked to increase screening in coming months in communities with lower per-capita testing rates.
“Making sure that those local communities who might be lower in terms of per-capita testing rates might be subject to higher positive test cases, or might be very diverse in the multicultural fabric, all have the same access to testing opportunities,” Ms Mikakos said.
“We're going to have a very targeted strategy, in addition to our normal testing program over the next three months.
“So we're going to have a rolling program every three weeks of moving to different locations, making sure that we can reach those hard-to-reach communities and those hard-to-reach individuals in our state.
“Please keep getting tested even if you have mild symptoms.”
More to come