Five days of lockdown for Victoria
MELBOURNE: Frustration is high for Victorian businesses facing a fiveday lockdown over what was expected to be a bumper weekend of trading and dining out due to the Australian Open and Valentine’s Day.
Victoria has entered a ``short, sharp circuitbreaker'' lockdown amid fears the highly infectious UK strain of coronavirus has spread in the community.
Premier Daniel Andrews announced the lockdown yesterday from 11.59pm last night until Wednesday as a result of the Holiday Inn outbreak which now numbers 13 cases.
Five new cases were recorded yesterday — an assistant manager at the quarantine hotel and four close contacts of people who earlier tested positive.
All five were selfisolating at the time they tested positive.
Genomic testing on earlier cases confirmed they had the more virulent UK strain of the virus.
Victoria's Covid19 testing commander Jeroen Weimar said more than 900 people were selfisolating after coming into contact with cases.
Victorian Chamber of Commerce chief executive Paul Guerra said while the lockdown was necessary, businesses could not keep ``paying the price for shortcomings'' in the state's hotel quarantine system.
``This weekend was slated to be one of our busiest for some time, with the Australian Open and other sporting events, Valentine's Day, weddings and functions planned.
``It's another massive blow to our economy which was just starting to get back on its feet.
The Australian Open tennis tournament, as well as the AFLW and other sporting events, will continue without crowds.
Owner of Lover restaurant in Windsor, Will Newton, said the lockdown news was ``heartbreaking'' and ``soul destroying’’, particularly as Valentine's Day tomorrow would have been his busiest day of the year.
The restaurateur will lose up to $40,000 of income from tomorrow alone, as he was booked out for four sittings. Newton said his recovery from the disruption of the pandemic had only just begun in recent weeks.
``We will just go into zombie mode for a few days and have our fingers crossed that is only a pause and not an extended break again,'' he said.
Lover restaurant will keep paying staff despite no longer having any financial support from the government.
Melbourne Lord Mayor Sally Capp called on Victorians to pull together and reduce the spread of the virus but also acknowledged the lockdown was ``devastating'' for the business community.
``The sooner we can get through the lockdown by doing the right thing, the sooner we can help businesses open their doors again,'' she said. — AAP
BRASILIA: Medical teams working to immunise Brazil’s remote indigenous villages against the coronavirus have encountered fierce resistance in some communities where evangelical missionaries are stoking fears of the vaccine, tribal leaders and advocates say.
On the Sao Francisco reservation in the state of Amazonas, Jamamadi villagers sent health workers packing with bows and arrows when they visited by helicopter this month, said Claudemir da Silva, an Apurina leader representing indigenous communities on the Purus river, a tributary of the Xingu.
‘‘It’s not happening in all villages, just in those that have missionaries or evangelical chapels where pastors are convincing the people not to receive the vaccine, that they will turn into an alligator and other crazy ideas,’’ he said by phone.
That has added to fears that Covid19 could roar through Brazil’s more than 800,000 indigenous people, whose communal living and often precarious healthcare make them a priority in the national immunisation programme.
Tribal leaders blame Brazil’s farright President Jair Bolsonaro and some of his avid supporters in the evangelical community for stoking scepticism about coronavirus vaccines, despite a national death toll that lags only the United States.
‘‘Religious fundamentalists and evangelical missionaries are preaching against the vaccine,’’ said Dinamam Tuxa, a leader of APIB, Brazil’s largest indigenous organisation.
The Association of Brazilian Anthropologists denounced unspecified religious groups in a statement on Wednesday for spreading false conspiracy theories to ‘‘sabotage’’ the vaccination of indigenous people.
Many pastors of Brazil’s urban evangelical megachurches are urging followers to get vaccinated, but they say missionaries in remote territories have not got the message.
‘‘Unfortunately, some pastors who lack wisdom are spreading misinformation to our indigenous brethren,’’ said Pastor Mario Jorge Conceicao of the Assembly of God Traditional Church in Manaus, the capital of Amazonas state.
The Government’s indigenous health agency Sesai said in a statement it was working to raise awareness of the importance of Covid immunisation.
Bolsonaro has played down the severity of the virus and refused to take a vaccine himself. He has aimed special derision at the country’s most widely available shot, made by China’s Sinovac Biotech, citing doubts about its ‘‘origins’’.
At an event in December, the president ridiculed vaccine maker Pfizer because he said the company had refused to assume liability for collateral effects in talks with his Government.
‘‘If you take the vaccine and turn into an alligator, it’s your problem. If you turn into Superman or women grow beards, I have nothing to do with that,’’ Bolsonaro said sarcastically.
Pfizer has said it proposed standard contractual guarantees to the Brazilian Government that other countries accepted before using its vaccine.
Access to social media even in remote corners of Brazil has fanned false rumours about the coronavirus vaccines.
For instance, 56yearold tribal chief Fernando Katukina, of the Noke Koi people near the Peru border, died on February 1 of cardiac arrest related to diabetes and congestive heart failure. Word spread rapidly on social media and radio that the Covid19 vaccine he received in January had caused his death.
The Butantan biomedical centre, which is producing and distributing the Sinovac vaccine, scrambled to convince indigenous people that was not the case.
‘‘The social media messages saying that Fernando Katukina died after taking a Covid19 vaccine are fake news,’’ Butantan wrote in a tweet.
Covid19 has killed at least 957 indigenous people, according to APIB, out of 48,071 confirmed infections among half of Brazil’s 300 native ethnic groups. The numbers could be much higher, because health agency Sesai only monitors indigenous people living on reservations.