26 infections and the Australian state is therefore locked down for a week

Epidemiologists are worried as a number of those infected have been living with symptoms for at least a week. In total, those infected have visited at least eighty different locations. An infected person visited a busy stadium.

“ Highly contagious variant ”

Additionally, there are concerns that it affects the Indian variant of the virus. “Today we have seen more evidence that we are dealing with a highly contagious variant of the virus,” Victoria Prime Minister James Merlino said. “A variation to be worried about that runs faster than we’ve ever recorded.”

Authorities have already identified more than 10,000 people who could have been in contact with an infected person. The fear is that the number of people infected is increasing exponentially.

Insufficient test capacity

“There is no collective immunity in Australia,” says virologist Jane Halton to the Australian 9News of. “In addition, the testing capacity is insufficient.” The wait time has been reduced to several hours at various test sites in Melbourne:

It is still unclear how the virus entered the community. To prevent the epidemic from spreading further, residents are not allowed to travel more than five kilometers from their homes.

Mouth masks are mandatory everywhere, indoors and outdoors. Shopping is only permitted once per day by a member of the household and all non-essential shops are closed.

Winter at the door

The travel bubble between Australia and New Zealand was already on hiatus earlier this week when it emerged that new infections had been detected in Victoria. The virus has been eliminated in both countries, but now that vaccination is not progressing and winter is approaching, the chances of another outbreak are high.