Australia has no appetite for reopening borders: PM Scott Morrison

Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison on Sunday said the countryrsquos borders will remain closed indefinitely amid the ongoing Covid19 pandemicMorrison said in a media interview that there is no ldquoappetiterdquo among Australians to reopen the countryrsquos borders to international travellers as Covid19 continues to spread throughout the world reports Xinhua news agency ldquoI donrsquot see an appetite for that at the momentrdquo he saidldquoI think what wersquore seeing at the moment is the appreciation of the people that the pandemic isnrsquot going anywhere All I know is once you let it Covid19 back in again you cannot get it out Yoursquove crossed that thresholdrdquo the Prime Minister addedThe government had previously said that the borders will reopen once the adult population has been vaccinated against the virus However Morrison said that he could not guarantee that would be the caseHe said there was not yet ldquoconsiderable clinical evidence that tells us transmission is preventable I think Australians want to ensure that the way wersquore living at the moment is maintainedrdquoAs of Sunday morning there had been 263 million vaccines administered in Australia while the overall Covid19 caseload and death toll stood at 29906 and 910 respectivelyThe government initially planned to vaccinate the entire population by October but hopes were dashed after the early stages of the rollout were plagued by supply issues In the meantime Morrison said the government was continuing to work on how vaccinated people could be given greater freedomsldquoThe next big step that can be taken is that Australians who are vaccinated based on clear evidence that this prevents transmissibility are able to travel and return to Australia without having to hotel quarantine and ideally we only have to engage in some sort of home quarantine of a less restrictive naturerdquo he said AgenciesIraq to isolate Indian evacuees for 14 daysThe Iraqi government has decided to impose a 14day quarantine on those evacuated from India to ensure that they were not infected with the new double mutant Covid19 variant Ryadh AbdulAmir head of the Public Health Department in the Iraqi Health Ministry told the media that the first batch of evacuees would be quarantined in a hotel and tested and monitored for 14 days before leavingIndian UK variants detected in SAFifteen cases of the Indian and British Covid19 variants have been detected in South Africa Health Minister Zweli Mkhize said According to Mkhize the Network for Genomic Surveillance in South Africa confirmed four cases of the B16172 variant which was first detected in India were registered in Gauteng and KwaZuluNatal reports Xinhua news agency26 lawmakers in Nepal test positiveAt least 26 members of the House of Representatives in Nepal have tested positive for Coronavirus just ahead of a key vote on Monday on a motion of confidence called by Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli The secretariat of the federal parliament conducted the polymerase chain reaction tests for lawmakers ahead of the key vote with tests returned positive for 18 of them while eight others were already infected said Gopal Nath Yogi secretary at the House of Representatives817345No of new cases reported globally in the past 24 hours157756810Total no of cases worldwide3284985Total no of deaths worldwideSource WHOJohns Hopkins