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COVID-19 Lockdown Ends in Australian City of Perth

Phil Mercer

   SYDNEY - A snap three-dayCOVID-19lockdown issetto end Monday in the
   Australian city of Perth.The shutdown was orderedFriday after the man
   -- a traveler who returned from overseas --escaped from a quarantine
   hotel housingotherpassengers returning fromabroad.TheAustralian Medical
   Associationsaidauthorities are not doing enough to protect
   returnedtravelersinenforcingmandatory quarantine from infectionsand
   hotel facilities were not built tocontainthe spread of the virus.

   Perth's lockdown will end Monday after Western Australia recorded no
   new community coronavirus cases in the past 24 hours.Businesses and
   schools will be allowed to reopen.Some restrictions will remain for the
   next four days.Masks will be mandatory, and gatherings will be limited
   to 20 people.

   The lockdown was imposed Friday after the virus spread in the corridors
   of an isolation hotel in the Western Australian state capital. A
   54-year-old man stayingadjacent toa couple with coronavirus, who had
   returned from India, was infected.

   Officials have said the traveler was allowed to leave the hotel after
   testing negative for the virusandafter a two-week isolation period.
   Buthe returned a positive result a few days later.Two other people are
   known to have been infected as health authorities have raced to track
   hundreds of other close or casual contacts of the man, who spent days
   in Perth before flying to Melbourne.

   Australia has banned foreigntravelersfor more than a year to curb the
   spread of COVID-19, but citizens and permanent residents are allowed to
   return, where they face mandatory quarantine.Australia is now limiting
   arrivals from India because of the worsening coronavirus crisis there.
   FILE - Australian Broadcasting Corp. journalist Bill Birtles walks into
   a hotel for quarantine in Sydney, Australia, Sept. 8, 2020.

   Thecountry's association for doctors and medical students,
   theAustralian Medical Association,or the AMA,believes that hotels are
   not properly equipped or built tocontainthespread of thevirus.

   AMA president Dr.Omar Khorshid is calling on Australia's federal and
   state governments to set up purpose-built isolation facilities.

   "I suspect everyone has thought that the vaccine program would mean the
   end of the need for quarantine," he said. "But as we are seeingmore and
   moremutations in the virus and these huge outbreaks, for instance, what
   is happening in India, the reality is that we are going to need
   quarantine for some time even once our population is vaccinated.So,
   what we would like to see is our national Cabinet, which is now meeting
   again twice a week, you know, come together and work out a pathway
   towards dedicated quarantine facilities that can be used either in this
   pandemic or in future pandemics."

   Australia has managed to avoid the worst of the global pandemic.

   Fewer that 30,000 COVID-19 cases have been diagnosed and more than 900
   deaths recorded, according to health authorities.

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