Coronavirus: Australia’s Victoria sees record cases as Melbourne protests fizzle out

Australia is battling a third wave of Covid-19 infections sparked by the Delta variant, and saw three days of anti-lockdown protests in Melbourne

Elsewhere, Japan will provide 30 million additional vaccine doses and the Philippines has ordered the police and military to augment hospital staff

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Australian police speak with a man during a patrol to prevent protests by construction workers and demonstrators against Covid-19 regulations in Melbourne on Thursday. Photo: AFP

Published: 3:15pm, 23 Sep 2021Updated: 11:24pm, 23 Sep 2021

Melbourne’s streets were largely quiet on Thursday after three days of anti-lockdown protests, with hundreds of police officers on patrol in the city to prevent another rally as Covid-19 cases in Victoria hit a daily pandemic record.

Police in central Melbourne were checking people’s reasons for being outside, footage on social media showed, after a violent protest on Wednesday in Australia’s second-largest city resulted in more than 200 arrests.

A vaccination centre at the Melbourne Town Hall would be shut until Monday after several of its staff were physically and verbally abused on their way to work, the operator said on Thursday.

“Why would you abuse, as I’m told, why would you spit on people who are doing that sort of work?,” Premier Daniel Andrews said in a media briefing in Melbourne, the state capital. “That is ugly, that is uncalled for.”

Hundreds of protesters have taken to the streets in the city of 5 million since officials earlier this week ordered a two-week closure of building sites and made vaccines mandatory for construction workers to limit the spread of the virus.

Police and union officials have said extremist and far-right groups joined the demonstrations.