Coronavirus updates LIVE: COVID-19 cases worldwide pass 3.3 million - The Age

Flu numbers are down. Less road fatalities have been reported. Emergency departments are quiet.

Social distancing and restrictions on public gatherings appear to be stopping the spread of COVID-19 in Australia, but these measures are also producing a range of other health outcomes – good and bad.

People exercising in Willoughby Park, resisting the urge to be sedentary during the COVID-19 crisis.Credit:Edwina Pickles

Flu

Influenza cases are dramatically lower this year, with 20,216 cases reported to the National Notifiable Disease Surveillance System compared to 43,108 cases for the same period in 2019.

"Influenza levels in the community are currently low due to social distancing measures and better hand hygiene," a NSW Health spokeswoman said.

However, a spokesman for the federal Health Department said the number of influenza cases in 2020 is 26 per cent higher than the average number of cases over the past five years.

There have also been significant declines in other communicable diseases such as Legionnaires' disease, whooping cough, sexually-transmitted diseases such as chlamydia and gonorrhea, dengue and Q fever – but an increase in Rotavirus.

Chance Pistoll, a GP and lecturer in primary care at Melbourne Medical School, said there had been a significant increase in people attending their GP for the influenza vaccine.

"This is a really great unintended outcome and it looks at this stage we might have dodged a bullet with respect to avoiding the worst of the flu season," he said.

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Labor’s education spokeswoman Tanya Plibersek has called on the Morrison government to stop the “mixed messages” on schools after the national consensus on schooling collapsed.

Education Minister Dan Tehan on Sunday said Victorian Premier had demonstrated a “failure of leadership” for not coming up with a plan to reopen the state’s schools.

Ms Plibersek said parents should follow the medical advice, but “we don’t need the federal education minister trying to bully and harass state education ministers and state governments”.

“States and territories have been working so well with the Commonwealth government,” she said.

“Everybody wants to see kids back in the classroom as quickly as possible… what we don’t want is the mixed messages about whether it is safe.”

Queensland has one new novel coronavirus case on Sunday, taking the state total to 1035.

Health Minister Steven Miles says the new patient is in Brisbane's south, state health authorities are unsure how the individual contracted the virus, with tracers working to track the source.

There are only 53 active COVID-19 cases left in Queensland, with nine of those in hospital and four in intensive care.

In that updated 1035 total, 976 of those patients have recovered, meaning Queensland's COVID-19 recovery rate sits at 94.3 per cent.

Mr Miles says 35 COVID-19 fines were issued by police on Saturday during the first day of eased movement restrictions, which was deemed a good result given the state's size.

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G'day everyone! It's Roy Ward here and I'll be running the blog for the rest of this quite hectic Sunday.

Victoria has seen a surprise development with 13 new cases discovered although with the new testing stations there was always the possibility of more cases emerging. The decision to close Meadowglen Primary School for three days after a person at the school tested positive for COVID-19 is also a concern.

So we still have a lot of stories to come this afternoon and this evening. Please keep following along and feel free to leave a comment on the blog or shoot me a tweet at @rpjward - many thanks!

In case you missed it earlier, a teacher at Meadowglen Primary School in Epping has tested positive for coronavirus. The school will be closed for cleaning for three days.

Loretta Piazza told radio station 3AW the employee with the virus was a male music teacher who had mild symptoms and was "doing just fine".

She said he was part of a "fairly big cluster" of cases early on in the outbreak and tried to get tested but didn't fit the criteria at the time.

He was then tested more recently and found to have the virus.

Dr Piazza said the teacher had not come into contact with any students this year.

Two teachers who have been in contact with him will now quarantine for two weeks, however they are not showing any systems.

Labor has called for Australia's immigration program to be overhauled and curtailed in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic, saying Australian workers must "get a fair go and a first go at jobs", in comments that form common ground with some Coalition MPs.

Home affairs spokeswoman Kristina Keneally, who is part of Labor's core leadership group, said the country had an unprecedented chance to shift the immigration program away from the "lazy" approach used by governments of all persuasions to boost the economy at the expense of local workers and community concerns.

Labor's home affairs spokeswoman Kristina KeneallyCredit:AAP

In an opinion piece for The Sunday Age today, Senator Keneally writes: "The post-COVID-19 question we must ask now is this: when we restart our migration program, do we want migrants to return to Australia in the same numbers and in the same composition as before the crisis? Our answer should be no."

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The map below shows how many new coronavirus cases have been recorded in each Victorian local government area over the past fortnight.

Of the state's 79 council areas, 28 have recorded a net increase in their COVID-19 case numbers over the past two weeks.

Six new cases have been confirmed among Melbourne City Council residents, four in Boroondara, Darebin, Melton and Nillumbik and three in Melton.

Unfortunately, the health department does not publish information on the number of active cases in each local government area.

Keep in mind that this map shows where people who have tested positive to COVID-19 typically reside. It doesn't tell us their current location or where they were infected. It also means that people from interstate or overseas who have tested positive for coronavirus while in Victoria are not showing up in the data.

Federal Education Minister Dan Tehan has lashed Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews for refusing to have a plan to reopen the state's schools, saying he was taking a "sledgehammer" to schooling and jeopardising the national consensus on schools.

In an escalation of the federal government's calls for Victoria to return to face-to-face learning, Mr Tehan said the Victorian Premier's reluctance to reopen schools was a clear "failure of leadership".

Education Minister Dan Tehan.Credit:Alex Ellinghausen

When asked about the comments this morning, Victorian Health Minister Jenny Mikakos highlighted the fact a teacher testing positive to COVID-19 overnight, which has forced a primary school in Epping to close for three days.

Queensland has recorded one new coronavirus case on Sunday, taking the state total to 1035.

Health Minister Steven Miles says state health authorities were unsure how the new patient, from Brisbane's south, contracted the virus.

There are 53 active COVID-19 cases left in Queensland, with nine of those in hospital and four in intensive care.

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You can watch the state's coronavirus update from Victorian Health Minister Jenny Mikakos in the video below:

The main information to come out of the press conference:

• Thirteen new cases of COVID-19 have been confirmed since overnight, bringing the state's running total to 1384.
• A total of 1300 people have recovered from coronavirus. Twelve people remain in hospital, including seven in intensive care. These numbers are unchanged from yesterday.
• Six of the new cases announced today are connected to a Melbourne meatpacking plant that had already been linked to three cases.
• A teacher at Meadowglen Primary School in Epping has tested positive for coronavirus, and the school will close for three days.

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2020-05-03 04:01:00Z
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