Authorities are urging young people to stay home and follow social distancing recommendations, after it was revealed young adults account for roughly a third of cases in Victoria’s recent COVID-19 spike.
“I would say to anyone who is young, from teenager to 20s or 30s, don’t just think about your family, think about what this might mean in terms of transmission through your entire community and what the consequences might be for those who are most at risk,” Victoria’s Chief Health Officer, Professor Brett Sutton, told reporters on Sunday.
He went on to compare the situation to the US, where social distancing is widely ignored and young people are often asymptomatic.
“In the same way we have seen the US cases take off like nothing else but deaths have continued to fall, there has been a transmission to a younger population,” he said.
“We have seen a greater proportion of our recent cases in the 20 to 40-year age group. We are not going to see those people requiring hospital but the danger still is there.
“If we continue to have cases at 40, 50 a day, unfortunately we will see deaths associated with it because it represents a lot of transmission and there will be a lot of vulnerable people who will be potentially exposed.”
In recent days, the Victorian government has pointed to a number of small slip-ups which helped spread the virus, including sharing a lighter and carpooling, as well as more serious cases like having large family gatherings.
In the past week, over 200 new COVID-19 cases have been recorded in the state thanks to a new testing blitz. In response, people have been told to avoid the hotspot suburbs of Maidstone, Albanvale, Sunshine West, Hallam, Brunswick West, Fawkner, Reservoir and Pakenham.
However as the number of cases continues to grow, the state might just lose some of the progress made earlier in the year.
