No of unemployed people in Australia exceeds 1 million for first time

A cook makes dumplings for takeaway orders in the window of a restaurant in Melbourne's Chinatown. Pic/AFP

The number of unemployed people in Australia has increased by some 16,000 between June and July, and has surpassed 1 million for the first time on record, head of the Labour Statistics at the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) Bjorn Jarvis said on Thursday. The unemployment in Australia is increasing amid the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

"The number of unemployed people rose by nearly 16,000 between June and July. For the first time, there were more than one million people out of work, available to work and actively looking for work," Jarvis said, as quoted by the ABS. The World Health Organisation (WHO) declared the COVID-19 outbreak a pandemic on March 11.

To date, more than 20.5 million people have been infected with the coronavirus worldwide, with over 748,000 fatalities, according to Johns Hopkins University. Australia has confirmed over 22,000 COVID-19 cases so far, with more than 360 fatalities.

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