Hundreds of Ballarat residents have flooded testing sites as the number of exposure sites climbed to more than 30, including three major shopping centres.
Key points:
- The Ballarat COVID cluster currently stands at six cases
- Authorities brace for a busy day across Ballarat’s six testing sites
- 10,000 extra Pfizer doses will be available over the next two to three weeks
Stockland Wendouree, Myer Central and Delacombe Town Centre are some of the latest exposure sites to be listed by Victorian Health Department.
Target, Kmart, Big W, and four supermarkets are also among the locations.
Information on exposure sites can be found on the Department of Health website.
This comes as Ballarat residents will join Melburnians in getting slightly more freedoms from midnight as 70 per cent of Victorians aged over 16 have now received at least one dose of a COVID vaccine.
Gatherings of up to five fully-vaccinated people from two households will be allowed outdoors while partially-vaccinated or unvaccinated people can socialise with one other person outside.
The changes also include expanding the 5 kilometre travel limit to 10 kilometres.
In the rest of regional Victoria, gyms, outdoor and indoor pools will reopen with density limits.
Ballarat testing sites:
- Victoria Park Military Dr, Newington — Drive through, 9am-8pm
- Ballarat Aquatic & Lifestyle Centre Gillies St N, — Walk in 10am-5.30pm
- The Ballarat Sports Events Centre, 989 Norman St, Wendouree — Drive through 4pm-6pm
- Ballarat UFS testing centre, Ballarat Central — appointment only
- 4Cyte Pathology Ballarat COVID-19 Collections, Skipton Street, Redan — walk-in
- Pop-up at Marty Busch Reserve, Sebastopol — drive through 9-6pm
Business support, construction restricted
The Victorian Government will continue to provide business support payments throughout September, where restrictions are affecting operations.
Automatic payments of between $5,600 and $40,000 will be made to help pay wages, rent and other expenses.
Eligible licensed venues will also receive automatic payments until the end of the month to help with the effects of ongoing density limits.
But extra restrictions will be placed on the construction industry as the state government tries to stop the virus leaking out of Melbourne into regional Victoria.
Construction workers will be banned from travelling between regional Victoria and Melbourne from 11:59pm tonight.
ABC News: John Gunn
)
This comes after an authorised worker unknowingly infected several people in Ballarat, leading to the current outbreak.
Employees in the construction industry will also have to provide proof of a COVID vaccine by Friday week.
Ballarat property developer Stuart Benjamin said the ban could cause significant delays to projects in the state’s west.
“So that’s a significant impact on these projects, to lose 20 per cent of their workforce.
“A lot of them tend to be specialist trades, so they’re trades that you need for a particular task that will stop the job from going forward.
“It could be inspections or it could be actual construction tasks.”
Surgeries to continue
Despite the lockdown entering its second day, Ballarat Health Services acting chief executive Melanie Robertson said she hoped most surgeries would be able to continue.
“At the moment, surgeries are continuing,” she said.
ABC: Dominic Cansdale
)
But she said some surgeries might need to be postponed in the future.
Visitors to the hospital will only be allowed in exceptional circumstances.
“Visitors are restricted at the hospital. Once again, we do this to protect our community. It’s not something that we do lightly,” she said.
Some Ballarat Health Services staff have been furloughed while isolating after visiting exposure sites.
But Ms Robertson said it was unlikely the health service would need outside support like Shepparton did during its outbreak.
Loading form…
