Brisbane

Brisbane Coronavirus Lockdown 31st July 2021

Queensland Deputy Premier Steven Miles has announced LGAs will be plunged into a snap three-day lockdown from 4pm today after the state recorded six new locally acquired cases. Mr Miles said the new cases include…

Brisbane has been plunged into a three-day lockdown which the Deputy Premier Steven Miles has said will be the “strictest” enforced on Queensland throughout the pandemic.

From 4pm on Saturday, 11 Local Government Areas in southeast Queensland will be forced to stay home until Tuesday afternoon after six new local cases were reported.

Health authorities declared the only four reasons any residents in those areas can leave home after the new infections from the mystery cluster were confirmed to have contracted the highly infectious Delta variant.

Those few reasons to leave home include:

  • Buy essentials such as grocery and medications
  • Work if you can’t work from home. No school, except for those children of essential workers
  • Exercise within 10km from home
  • Healthcare, including to get a Covid-19 vaccination or to provide help, care or support

The affected LGAs are Brisbane, Ipswich, Logan City, Moreton Bay, Redlands, Sunshine Coast, Gold Coast, Somerset, Noosa, Lockyer Valley and Scenic Rim.

There will be no visitors to homes in those LGAs, and non-essential businesses will be forced to close down.

“Hospitality – pubs, clubs, cafes – will be restricted to takeaway only,” Mr Miles said.

“Cinemas, entertainment venues, hairdressers, gyms, places of worship will all be closed.”


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Brisbane streets will again be emptied. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Dan Peled

Brisbane streets will again be emptied. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Dan PeledSource:News Corp Australia

The lockdown rules will apply to those who have been in the impacted LGAs from 1am on Saturday morning, Mr Miles said as he urged millions of Queenslanders to not wait until 4pm and “please go home” immediately.

“So, even if you are no longer in those 11 LGAs, if you were at 1:00am this morning (or after), these restrictions apply no matter where you are now,” he said.

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“Grocery stores will stay open throughout the lockdown so please don’t think that you need to rush to get essential items.

“You will be permitted to leave your homes for essential items. Please don’t rush our grocery stores — that creates a risk of infection that we want to avoid.”

The 10km geographic restriction is a tougher layer to this lockdown compared to the many enforced on Queensland over the last 18-months, with health authorities increasingly anxious of a destructive outbreak similar to the current crisis in NSW.

The health Minister said “we have got to get this right”. Picture: NCA NewsWire/Tertius Pickard

The health Minister said “we have got to get this right”. Picture: NCA NewsWire/Tertius PickardSource:News Corp Australia

Chief health officer Jeannette Young pleaded with those in the southeast to stay at home because she doesn’t “want people going out of their immediate area and then spreading the virus to a broader area”.

“At the moment, I don’t know where this virus is in southeast Queensland,” she told reporters on Saturday morning.

“It could be anywhere. I could be in the Sunshine Coast, because we had one of those original cases up there and they live in Buderim.

“It could be down in the Gold Coast, because we had one of those original cases down there when they were being managed.

“We know it’s in Taringa and we know it’s in Indooroopilly and we know that two members of that family went out to Ipswich to attend the vaccine clinic.”

Health Minister Yvette D’Ath said the crisis in Sydney was a pressing factor in the decision to lockdown millions of Queenslanders.

“New South Wales had one case on 16 June. Thirty-eight days later, they are at 3000 cases,” she said.

“From that one person — 38 days, 3,000 cases. Sadly, 13 people have died just from that one cluster.

“We have to get this right.”

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