Delta spreads, Australia widens Covid lockdown

The streets of Sydney, Brisbane, Perth and Darwin have fallen quiet, with millions of Australians under stay-at-home orders as the country battles multiple small outbreaks of the highly contagious Delta variant of the coronavirus.

The outback town of Alice Springs became the latest Australian population hub to lock down on Wednesday, as anger mounts over the country’s slow coronavirus vaccine roll-out.

Australia relied heavily on border closures and mandatory hotel quarantine for overseas arrivals to curb the spread of the virus, but has recently struggled to contain the strain.(AFP)

The streets of Sydney, Brisbane, Perth and Darwin have fallen quiet, with millions of Australians under stay-at-home orders as the country battles multiple small outbreaks of the highly contagious Delta variant of the coronavirus.

Australia relied heavily on border closures and mandatory hotel quarantine for overseas arrivals to curb the spread of the virus, but has recently struggled to contain the strain.

Alice Springs, in the central Australian desert, was the latest place ordered to lockdown as an “extreme precautionary” measure designed to protect a large indigenous population, a state official said. The 72-hour restrictions came after it was revealed a man linked to a cluster at a nearby gold mine spent several hours at the local airport.

France is headed for 4th wave in autumn: Adviser

France is likely to have a fourth wave of Covid-19 due to a resurgence of cases caused by the Delta variant, said the French government’s leading scientific adviser Jean-François Delfraissy.

Delfraissy said Covid-19 vaccines will help mitigate the effects of this new wave, which could hit France by September or October. “We will have a fourth wave, but it will be much more moderate than the previous three waves because the level of vaccinations is different compared to before,” he said.

Putin rejects mandatory jabs amid record deaths

President Vladimir Putin, who said he has taken the Sputnik V vaccine, added that he was opposed to mandatory vaccinations for Russians but urged the jab-sceptic population to get inoculated as his country battles a deadly third wave. “Preventing the further spread of the epidemic is possible only with the help of vaccination,” Putin said.

As the phone-in kicked off, a government tally showed 669 coronavirus fatalities over 24 hours - a national high for the second day in a row.