Tougher COVID-19 Lockdown Measures Imposed on Australia’s Biggest City
Voice of America
SYDNEY - Australia’s biggest city, Sydney, has ordered a shutdown of building sites and most shops, and is banning workers from leaving several Covid-19 hotspots. The city of 5 million people has been under lockdown since June 26 as authorities race to contain the spread of the delta variant. The state of Victoria is also in lockdown.
Twelve million Australians - or about half of the population - are in COVID-19 lockdown. In New South Wales, the most populous state, authorities recorded 111 new cases in the previous 24 hours, up from 97 the day before. Health officials have said that around 80% of the infections are from three areas in Sydney. In response, the government has imposed some of Australia’s toughest lockdown regulations.FILE - Danny Fenster, center, hugs his mother Rose Fenster as former U.S. diplomat Bill Richardson, right, looks on at John F. Kennedy Airport in New York, Nov. 16, 2021. Journalist Fenster was held in a Myanmar prison. Harrison Li holds a photo of his father, Kai Li, on Jan. 23, 2024, in Palo Alto, Calif. Li's father, Kai, remains detained in China on espionage charges his family says are bogus and FILE - A Hamas cameraman stands behind Israeli soldier Gilad Schalit, released after more than five years in captivity, on the Egyptian side of the Rafah border crossing on Oct. 18, 2011. FILE - Families and friends of current and former hostages and detainees gather outside of the White House in Washington, May 3, 2023, to ask the Biden administration for more help. FILE - Joey and Paula Reed pose for a photo with a portrait of their son Marine veteran and Russian prisoner Trevor Reed at their home in Fort Worth, Texas, Feb. 15, 2022. FILE - In this March 16, 2016, file photo, American student Otto Warmbier, center, is escorted at the Supreme Court in Pyongyang, North Korea.
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