Ah Shit, Queensland’s Borders Are Staying Closed To Sydney And Victoria After All

In reasonably predictable news given the imminent state election, Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk has confirmed that the state’s borders will remain closed to all of Victoria as well as Greater Sydney for the time being.

Queensland’s borders with regional New South Wales are still scheduled to re-open from this coming Tuesday, however the Premier asserted that it was still “too risky” for the state to accept people from Greater Sydney at this point in time.

Those residents in regional NSW will be able to cross the QLD border from 1am on Tuesday, November 3rd without having to gain clearance from Government authorities or participate in a 14-day quarantine.

However all residents of Greater Sydney’s 32 local government areas will remain subject to pre-existing border restrictions.

QLD Chief Health Officer Jeannette Young asserted that all 32 LGAs of Greater Sydney would be considered COVID hotspots as far as Queensland goes, stating “There are 4.8 million people who live in those 32 LGAs in Sydney. They are the risk, they are the ones moving around. One unlinked case means there is a problem in that community.”

The hard border with NSW has been a massive point of political contention in recent days, with NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian in particular taking aim at it.

“It is painful to me that New Zealanders can come and go from NSW but I can’t go to Queensland, I can’t go to WA and I don’t think that’s right,” Berejiklian told media earlier this morning.

NSW recorded 0 new locally acquired cases of COVID in the past 24 hours, but a spate of new local infections in recent days has seemingly motivated the decision from Queensland officials this morning.

Meanwhile Victoria recorded just 4 new cases of COVID-19 in the past 24 hours. However Chief Health Officer Brett Sutton stated that two of those cases are weak positives and could yet be ruled out as cases altogether, while one other is being considered a case of historic virus shedding and may not be registered as a new active case.

The Queensland State Election is scheduled to take place tomorrow, Saturday October 31st.

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