Australia’s two most populous states will close their shared border from Tuesday night as authorities battle to contain a spike in coronavirus cases that jeopardizes the nation’s economic recovery.
Throughout the pandemic, New South Wales and Victoria had resisted closing the border to avoid adding to economic disruption. But a resurgence of the virus, which has prompted a lockdown across 12 areas of the Victoria state capital, Melbourne, has forced a rethink.
"This is one of those precautionary measures, it is one of those things that I think will help us in broader terms contain the spread of the virus,” Victoria Premier Daniel Andrews told reporters on Monday. The state recorded another 127 cases of the virus overnight, and reported the death of a man in his 90s, taking the national toll to 105.