July 18, 2021 • 28 mins
The arrival of the COVID-19 Delta variant has thrown Australia’s two biggest cities back into lockdown, prompted State borders to slam shut again, and raised even more questions about the glacial pace of the nation’s vaccine rollout.
This 7NEWS Spotlight special examines how the Delta variant found its way here, why so much of Australia has been plunged back into crisis, and the terrible toll it is taking on the health of many Australians, our communities and our economy.
Told through the eyes of the people on the frontline – the real Australians who are fighting COVID-19 and fighting to survive it – this special report includes startling revelations about the failure of the vaccine rollout and first-hand accounts of battling the virus including from NSW Agriculture Minister Adam Marshall.
7NEWS Spotlight: Delta Crisis Exposed is essential listening for all Australians, as we confront one of the biggest public health scares in our nation’s history.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:17):
On the afternoon of June nine, flight FX seventy seven
makes its approach into Sydney. The FedEx plane had left
Honolulu nine hours before with its crew, cargo, and almost
certainly COVID. Someone on board has the highly contagious Delta variant.
(00:40):
Within one day, two people would get it. A little
over two weeks later, five million people would be confined
to their homes and living in fear, empty and desolate,
(01:08):
Sydney under lockdown, and Australia now under threat, the Delta
variant out of control and governments out of excuses. Bondye
back on COVID alert tonight. The inside story of the outbreak.
Speaker 2 (01:29):
A pandemic is a dramatic emergency of monumental proportions. It's
a war.
Speaker 3 (01:36):
It's a war against this virus.
Speaker 4 (01:38):
So we are completely vulnerable and at the mercy of
this virus.
Speaker 5 (01:42):
And we're vulnerable because we have the low level of vaccination,
the mishabs.
Speaker 2 (01:50):
We knew there were not enough vaccines in our country,
so we've ended up with a double whammy.
Speaker 1 (01:57):
The mistakes.
Speaker 3 (01:58):
It's utterly in excuse.
Speaker 5 (02:01):
If excuses were vaccines, we'd all be vaccinated by now.
Speaker 1 (02:05):
The missed opportunities.
Speaker 2 (02:07):
This by us was always going to tromp us in
some way or other, and we should never have imagined
that the relatively protected life we had last year was
one that was going to continue unabated until we got
our vaccine program right.
Speaker 4 (02:26):
It's the one job that the federal government had throughout
this pandemic, and so far they've dropped the ball.
Speaker 3 (02:34):
All right, I do three four, five six.
Speaker 1 (02:37):
And the explosive interview.
Speaker 6 (02:40):
Ministers those countries that you mentioned are looking at Australia
at the moment and laughing and saying that we have
got it wrong. You are the federal health minister. This
is a national health crisis. Have you considered resigning?
Speaker 1 (03:05):
For over a year, Sydney had been the luckiest of
capital cities. While COVID tour through the world, Sydney sauntered
to its mascless beat. When Melbourne went through months of lockdown,
Sydney barely suffered. But now, just as many other countries
were finally opening up, its luck ran out silently, and
(03:33):
suddenly the deadly Delta variant breached the city's defenses. Three
four left at three pm on June nine, FedEx Flight
seventy seven begins its final approach into Sydney. On the
streets below, a higher car driver from the city's east
(03:56):
is heading to the airport to pick up the crew
who avoid theuarantined red tape. Returning Australians have to go
through like army and police escorts instead waiting to take
them to their hotels. A state government supplied and approved
limousine drivers like this man.
Speaker 7 (04:15):
Welcome to Australia.
Speaker 6 (04:18):
Good luck to you and your family.
Speaker 1 (04:20):
We've chosen not to name him, but he has spoken
to us.
Speaker 3 (04:25):
A good right.
Speaker 1 (04:27):
He told us he was wearing a mask and yes
he was unvaccinated because of concerns over a family history
of blood cloths and health warnings about astrazenica. He was
in the queue for BISA, but despite being on the
front line, the sixty three year old driver wasn't fast tracked.
(04:48):
An inexcusable failure. That's not his fault.
Speaker 3 (04:54):
Yeah, I'll see you next time.
Speaker 2 (04:57):
People like limousine drivers, they were not prioritized and so
those people.
Speaker 8 (05:03):
Ended up not being vaccinated.
Speaker 2 (05:05):
We've been under the full solution that we were kind
of invulnerable to this virus to some extent with our
borders closed. But once the virus penetrates the border, as
it did in this instance, we then are no different
to anybody else.
Speaker 1 (05:25):
Flight FX seventy seven landed at three point thirty four PM.
Soon after the crew were tested for COVID, but the
results would not be known Immediately after the limo driver
dropped them to their hotel, he went home to his
wife at their Bondai apartment. She would be the next
(05:46):
to be infected. Fortress Sydney had just been breached.
Speaker 9 (05:54):
And now we're vulnerable because those borders aren't capable of
holding the virus back, no matter how much of it
and resource were put into that, and we're going to
end up being exposed when we're not yet ready.
Speaker 1 (06:10):
So why is it so dangerous? Why is not just
Sydney but Australia now so at risk. The delta variant
is the most contagious version of the coronavirus worldwide. It
spreads about two hundred and twenty five percent faster than
the original version of the virus.
Speaker 9 (06:34):
This is like fine sand that finds every even small
crack in the system.
Speaker 10 (06:41):
In the early stages of COVID, while its viral load
is still low, it's possible to have the virus and
test negative. Indeed, the first results from the FedEx flight
crew all came back negative. They stayed just one night
in Australia, but critically weren't swabbed a second time on
(07:02):
their way out. So why does New South Wales Health
believe it was one of the crew. Well, the genomic
sequence of the virus taken from the limo driver leaves
no doubt that it came from the US and they
were his point of contact.
Speaker 1 (07:30):
Initially, he showed no symptoms and was out and about.
He went to the Bell Cafe in Sydney's Ball Clues
and other cafes at Bondai Beach. He saw a movie
at a local cinema and shopped at Westville Bondai Junction,
one of the largest and busiest malls in Australia.
Speaker 9 (07:51):
We're seen in households the people passing the virus on
to others sixty percent high with this variant.
Speaker 1 (08:00):
The night before June fifteenth, the driver began suffering symptoms
after a restless sleep. He got up early so that
he and his wife could be among the first to
get tested that morning. The next day, the tests came
(08:22):
back positive. Soon after, contact traces plotted every place he'd
been to, and soon after that, within the New South
Wales government, reality.
Speaker 8 (08:34):
Hit Good morning everybody.
Speaker 1 (08:36):
At this point, preming a gladys Bereogiclian had a choice.
Option one, lockdown, hard and fast, or option two try
and manage it.
Speaker 4 (08:49):
She chose two, public safety first, but also keep the
economy open and our jobs going.
Speaker 1 (08:56):
Her light touch had kept the New South Wales open
for business throughout OVID and she hoped it would work again.
But initially Sydney was slack. Thirteen players title called divine lockdown.
NRL football is partied and hit under beds to avoid police.
Speaker 10 (09:13):
Having a party when you're not supposed to have a
party is not doing the right thing.
Speaker 1 (09:17):
The spread had started, but for many the message just
wasn't getting through.
Speaker 9 (09:23):
Yeah, something about this that makes people think that doesn't
apply to them. But you're contributing to something bigger than
your own health risk. Every time you put yourself at
risk in those around you, it is taking the virus
to your family, your friends, your connections, and we have
to actually recognize that unvaccinated, this is nothing like the flu.
(09:45):
Vaccination does the work of lockdowns and other things. Vaccination
turns the delta variant back into something much more benign.
Speaker 1 (09:55):
In any case, the light lockdown was too little, too late,
from zero cases to one every fifteen minutes, all in
a matter of days, from the cities east to west
and then down south all the way to Victoria. If
only Australia hadn't missed its opportunity when time was on
(10:18):
our side.
Speaker 3 (10:23):
We had the luxury of time.
Speaker 2 (10:25):
We saw everything unfold in the northern Hemisphere.
Speaker 3 (10:28):
We were at our sun.
Speaker 2 (10:30):
We could lock down our international borders. We did a
whole lot of things that could keep us safe.
Speaker 3 (10:36):
But we should never have.
Speaker 2 (10:38):
Allowed that luxury of time to translate into a sense
of non urgency about this virus.
Speaker 1 (10:46):
Ninety nine point five percent of COVID nineteen deaths in
the US in the past few months have been among
people who weren't vaccinated. Vaccines save lives. Our best protection
was never locked down, but vaccines.
Speaker 5 (11:03):
The fundamental mistake that was made last year was not
to procure enough vaccines.
Speaker 3 (11:09):
It is the worst failure of public.
Speaker 5 (11:11):
Administration I can recall. The mission should have been to
get as many vaccines as you can and get them
into the arms of Australians as quickly as possible. It
was only the single most important job the federal government had.
Speaker 1 (11:29):
Look at this graph. It shows the percentage of population
who have been double dosed in countries around the world,
thirty seven other countries before you get to Australia in
thirty eight and the last spot.
Speaker 5 (11:45):
You know, you can't say we couldn't get the vaccines
because other countries did.
Speaker 3 (11:54):
If I was in Australia, I'd be pretty upset.
Speaker 2 (11:57):
When we were offered advisor is now we did not
take that upright at the very beginning in the numbers
that we should have.
Speaker 11 (12:06):
I worry that cost might have been a factor of
the Pfizer vaccine is the most expensive of those out there.
Speaker 3 (12:12):
Having said that, I wonder how.
Speaker 11 (12:14):
Much the current lockdown is costing the government, how much
the government will have to spend in terms of COVID
relief funds.
Speaker 3 (12:23):
So it doesn't strike me as being a great decision.
Speaker 6 (12:29):
Should the Prime Minister have picked up the phone to
Fiser and made.
Speaker 3 (12:33):
An order, Certainly stuff like that helps.
Speaker 11 (12:36):
I've read that Benjamin Att Yahoo in Israel had thirty
separate conversations with the fires and CEO.
Speaker 2 (12:44):
These vaccines work, We've got.
Speaker 3 (12:47):
To get them fast.
Speaker 1 (12:54):
On do night, Sydney was Delta free nine one Limo
driver was infected. By July twelve, the city was not
only in lockdown, residents were now being locked up.
Speaker 10 (13:15):
It's your girlfriend that you're there with parto.
Speaker 12 (13:19):
So my name is and Angus form as.
Speaker 1 (13:35):
Ash and Angus live seven stories above ground zero, the
most dangerous block of flats in Australia. In this Bondi
Junction apartment complex, multiple people have tested positive for COVID
and have been transferred to quarantine all medical care. The
remaining residents are now locked in with police on guard outside.
(14:01):
What a difference a week makes.
Speaker 12 (14:03):
So Monday morning, I was up early to watch the
euro from twenty twenty five and I came out here
at halftime just to have a look over the city
as the sun was rising and stretched my legs with
here and I saw some police downstairs. And that's quite
taken it back as to what was going on and
how preciate it.
Speaker 3 (14:20):
I think it's one of those things that you just
think it's never going.
Speaker 1 (14:23):
To happen to me until it does.
Speaker 13 (14:25):
I actually got the text, and I think Ax was
in the shower at the time, and I remember walking
to the bathroom and just opening the shower door, and
same day it was COVID in the building.
Speaker 8 (14:35):
So I was shaking.
Speaker 1 (14:37):
It was scary.
Speaker 12 (14:40):
Yeah, it was scary.
Speaker 3 (14:42):
Good morning everybody.
Speaker 8 (14:43):
Yesterday we watched the press conference.
Speaker 10 (14:46):
At eleven and found out that rather than being two.
Speaker 12 (14:48):
Cases in the building was it was eight across five households.
Speaker 4 (14:52):
From my experience, you do not want to get it.
You seriously do not want to get it. It is
something that, no matter what your age and health and
fitness level, can really knock you around. Because it's certainly
knocked me around, that's for sure. So there were four
(15:19):
of us that went together for dinner, and I was
the only one of the four that actually contracted COVID nineteen.
Speaker 3 (15:25):
I'm still trying to work.
Speaker 4 (15:26):
Out how that actually happened.
Speaker 8 (15:28):
I was very careful, as we all were.
Speaker 4 (15:30):
We sat away from people in the restaurant, didn't brush
up against have any physical contact with anyone else in
the restaurant at all.
Speaker 8 (15:38):
We just weren't there that long. So how I got it.
Speaker 4 (15:42):
Is still a mystery, but it just highlights, I guess,
virulent and how contagious.
Speaker 8 (15:48):
This new variant, the Delta variant.
Speaker 4 (15:50):
Is.
Speaker 1 (15:53):
Adam Marshall getting the deadly Delta variant was no small thing,
not least because he could have crippled Parliament. You see,
by day twelve, COVID had entered the new South Wales Cabinet,
where Adam is Agriculture Minister. Like most Australians, he'd been
waiting his turn to be vaccinated. At first, the National
(16:16):
Party MP showed no symptoms.
Speaker 8 (16:20):
Parliament was sitting on the Tuesday. At that stage.
Speaker 4 (16:23):
Whilst I'd been exposed to COVID nineteen, I didn't have
the viral load in my system to have enough of
the virus to begin spreading it to other people.
Speaker 8 (16:33):
Thank goodness.
Speaker 4 (16:33):
If I'd have been spreading that to some of my
colleagues in Parliament, the results of that could have been catastrophic,
from the premiere all the way down. When it hit me,
it literally hit me. I felt fine, and then I
woke up and bang. It was literally like being run
over by a truck. And I was like that, laid
out flat for probably four or five days. This new
(16:58):
Delta variant, in my view, is very very strong. I've
had the flu, I've had colds. This was nothing like that.
Speaker 8 (17:06):
It was much much worse.
Speaker 3 (17:07):
How frightened, were you?
Speaker 4 (17:09):
I was quite worried at one point there. I remember
saying to myself, Look, if I wake up tomorrow and
I'm as bad as I am now or worse, I'm
I'm going to have to go to hospital. I probably
underestimated how very serious this new variant is, and certainly
(17:32):
going through that experience myself has made me more acutely
aware of how dangerous it is, how easy it is
to transmit, to be spread, and therefore for people to
catch it. Even if you have no physical contact with
people whatsoever, you can still catch it. And really it's
highlighted to me the importance of getting as many Australians
(17:55):
vaccinated as quickly as possible as we humanly can, because
being vaccinated is realistically the only true defense that we
have against this delta variant and any others that come
after it.
Speaker 1 (18:09):
Yet, even in this infected apartment block, where you'd think
emergency vaccinations would be a priority, the fearful weight goes on.
Speaker 6 (18:18):
Since the lockdown of the unit started. Has there been
any efforts from New South Wales Health or other departments
to get you guys vaccinated.
Speaker 3 (18:29):
That I've heard of today? To ask you a political question.
Speaker 6 (18:32):
There's a lot of criticism being directed towards the federal
government at the moment for those very low vaccine rates.
Have they stuffed up?
Speaker 8 (18:40):
They have stuffed up. Look, let's be frank. They do
need to should coade it.
Speaker 4 (18:43):
The national vaccination rollout has been an absolute shambles up
until this point. It's left Australians in a very vulnerable
position where we've got a very virulent and contagious strain
of COVID in our country and yet we have it
in the context of an Australian public that over ninety
percent are completely unvaccinated, so we are completely vulnerable and
(19:06):
at the mercy of this virus. I just think that's
not only disgraceful, it's also downright dangerous.
Speaker 1 (19:19):
Thirty two days after Flight FX seventy seven landed, the
government released this AD.
Speaker 4 (19:34):
I just think that ad was pointless at the moment
because people are keen to get jabbed, they.
Speaker 8 (19:41):
Just can't because there aren't enough doses, and so it
would have been better plowing that money.
Speaker 4 (19:46):
Into securing more doses more quickly so that we can
get jabbed.
Speaker 3 (19:50):
Authorized by the Australian government canbra.
Speaker 4 (19:53):
From my perspective, it strikes also the wrong message, even
if there were heaps of doses. The reason why we
want people to get vaccinated is because being vaccinated equals freedom.
It means that we don't have to have lockdowns or
any of these other draconian measures, because there will be
a level of protection in the community if everyone is vaccinated.
Speaker 1 (20:14):
Day one began with Delta on board. By day thirty six,
the deadly variant had gone viral, shutting down Australia's two
biggest cities, first Sydney and now Melbourne, which once again
is facing the strain and pain of lockdown and nerves
(20:36):
are framed far from the matting crowd in the quiet
of his electorate office. Australia's Health Minister Greg Hunt is
(20:57):
a man under pressure.
Speaker 3 (20:58):
And where we are for Greg one? Do three four
both seats?
Speaker 6 (21:03):
A little bit more of that question, Minister, Thank you
very much for your time. A pleasure if I could
begin by quoting the words of Adam Marshall, a coalition
minister in the new South Wales government, who we spoke
to earlier this week. The national vaccine rollout has been
an absolute shambles. It's not only disgraceful but dangerous. The
Commonwealth Government has dropped the ball. Your response to that.
Speaker 7 (21:26):
Well, as we speak, there will have been over nine
point six million people that have been vaccinated once or twice,
over nine point six million vaccinations, Minister.
Speaker 6 (21:37):
In terms of numbers tonight, one in two Australians is
in lockdown, one in ten is fully vaccinated. That sounds
like a failure to me.
Speaker 7 (21:46):
Well, no, with great respect, as we speak, it's thirty
four point five percent of Australians that have had vaccinations
on the popular.
Speaker 6 (21:55):
Romantics Minister, with respect, that's one dose of vaccine. The
numbers of Australia, the number of Australians that have had
actually roughly non semantics.
Speaker 7 (22:03):
It is the most fundamental and important figures and I
would ask you not to downplay the fact that over
a third of Australians have already had vaccination and that
is a critical protection.
Speaker 6 (22:15):
Australians are having to make up things on their registration
forms to get vaccines. I mean effectively they're being given
the choice of lying or dying. That is the reality.
They're so desperted for vaccines and they can't get this good.
Speaker 7 (22:28):
If you do have information, we would want you to
report it to us immediately.
Speaker 6 (22:32):
But is it good enough, sir, that they are feeling
that desperate? I mean tonight, in Sydney and Melbourne, the
two biggest cities in the country. Every pub and restaurant
is closed. People aren't earning an income, and there are
twenty year olds people in their twenties, I should say,
on ventilators in hospital in Sydney. Is that good enough?
Speaker 8 (22:49):
Well?
Speaker 7 (22:49):
Our goal is to have zero cases of community transmission
and zero lives loss. In the United Kingdom, there were
forty eight thousand cases in the last twenty four hours
as you and I are speaking, and sixty lives lost
in one day. So our circumstances are challenging in a
global pandemic, but our circumstances are so vastly different from
(23:12):
the experience of the overwhelming rest of the world.
Speaker 6 (23:16):
And yet ministers those countries that you mentioned are looking
at Australia at the moment and laughing and saying that
we have got it wrong. You are the federal health minister.
This is a national health crisis. Have you considered resigning?
Speaker 7 (23:30):
With great respect? Our task is to make sure that
we protect Australians. That's the fundamental thing. This week is
on track to be another record week of vaccination, but
it's a process that we have to go through to
bring forward as many Australians and that was always set
(23:51):
to occur over the course of twenty twenty one.
Speaker 6 (23:54):
Why didn't you pick up the phone to fires early
on an auto big.
Speaker 7 (23:58):
Well, we actually have secured forty million vaccines for Australia.
We've been able to bring forward additional vaccines earlier.
Speaker 6 (24:05):
You're making it sound like we're winning this race, but
if anybody is familiar with the figures, we're coming almost
dead last in terms of developed economies around the world
for vaccination rates. I mean, Malcolm Turnbull, your former boss,
who we spoke to earlier this week, says this is
his words, not mine. The federal government they've abjectly failed
and they've let Australia down. Your response, well.
Speaker 7 (24:27):
I respectfully disagree. Saving lives is the ultimate test. I mean,
I would ask you sometimes I imagine you're comparing us
to the UK. There were sixty lives lost in the
UK yesterday in one day, sixty souls gone from this earth.
And the test of everything that you're putting is the
(24:49):
comprehensive nature of all of the protections for a country.
Simple question, Taylor, do you think that sixty lives lost
is acceptable?
Speaker 6 (24:58):
I don't think any lives lost acceptable when they can
be avoided, not naturally, sir. So you're comparing us with
anyone to say anything to the contrary. But I'm not
in charge of I'm not in charge of vaccinating this country.
Speaker 7 (25:12):
You are correct, and that's exactly what's occurring.
Speaker 6 (25:15):
When was the last time you spoke to the CEO
of Pfizer.
Speaker 7 (25:19):
Well, that has been done both in writing and verbally.
The Prime Minister and I wrote in May that has
not been set out before previously because they had asked
us not to disclose it. As a consequence of that,
we were able to bring forward three million vaccines and
I'm happy to reveal that this evening that was not
(25:41):
previously disclosed, even though it was to our detriment not
talking about it, we did it. We achieved the outcome
for Australia. In addition to that, we have the Maderna
which is likely to start in September on our latest advice,
and novavaks the fifty one million do are likely to
be available in the final quarter of the year.
Speaker 6 (26:04):
Okay, minister, I really appreciate your time. Thanks for making
yourself available for us.
Speaker 7 (26:08):
Thanks Taylor.
Speaker 6 (26:22):
What's your message to Scott Morrison. I'm sure we'll be
watching as somebody who is quite clearly impacted by this
COVID lockdown. What would you like to say?
Speaker 8 (26:30):
I'd like to.
Speaker 13 (26:31):
Say that it'd be great to have some sort of
plan in place around vaccination rate, and you know, if
we get to eighty percent or whatever it might be,
this is what we will do at that point in time.
We will not put you know, lockdowns in place anymore
or whatever.
Speaker 3 (26:45):
Just having a plan to, having.
Speaker 13 (26:46):
A roadmap and having that sort of committed to would
be good.
Speaker 6 (26:51):
And now tell me about this famous sign plea's idea.
Speaker 3 (26:56):
If that is my idea.
Speaker 13 (26:58):
What we fight found was the couple will deliver us groceries.
Speaker 3 (27:01):
The calls won't deliver us alcohol.
Speaker 13 (27:03):
Because we need to show our ID and we can't
show our idea because we're in isolation.
Speaker 9 (27:07):
So we've been trying to figure out, yeah, what we're
going to do about.
Speaker 3 (27:12):
The vice of strange.
Speaker 12 (27:14):
What I think designed is just an example that whilst
this is a pretty terrible situation, that we are going
to kind of say so with a smile.
Speaker 6 (27:24):
Basically, we don't have enough people vaccinated. Is there an
approach we can take now that will speed things up?
Is there some way out of this that might right
the wrongs that we've previously committed.
Speaker 11 (27:37):
Look, I think you have to hold tight, help us
on the way. It won't be next week, but hopefully
in the coming weeks and months. By the end of
the year, you'll have people lighting up for all the
vaccine that you'll have.
Speaker 3 (27:49):
Is that's what we can hope for. The Radius VI
Theater
On the afternoon of June nine, flight FX seventy seven
makes its approach into Sydney. The FedEx plane had left
Honolulu nine hours before with its crew, cargo, and almost
certainly COVID. Someone on board has the highly contagious Delta variant.
(00:40):
Within one day, two people would get it. A little
over two weeks later, five million people would be confined
to their homes and living in fear, empty and desolate,
(01:08):
Sydney under lockdown, and Australia now under threat, the Delta
variant out of control and governments out of excuses. Bondye
back on COVID alert tonight. The inside story of the outbreak.
Speaker 2 (01:29):
A pandemic is a dramatic emergency of monumental proportions. It's
a war.
Speaker 3 (01:36):
It's a war against this virus.
Speaker 4 (01:38):
So we are completely vulnerable and at the mercy of
this virus.
Speaker 5 (01:42):
And we're vulnerable because we have the low level of vaccination,
the mishabs.
Speaker 2 (01:50):
We knew there were not enough vaccines in our country,
so we've ended up with a double whammy.
Speaker 1 (01:57):
The mistakes.
Speaker 3 (01:58):
It's utterly in excuse.
Speaker 5 (02:01):
If excuses were vaccines, we'd all be vaccinated by now.
Speaker 1 (02:05):
The missed opportunities.
Speaker 2 (02:07):
This by us was always going to tromp us in
some way or other, and we should never have imagined
that the relatively protected life we had last year was
one that was going to continue unabated until we got
our vaccine program right.
Speaker 4 (02:26):
It's the one job that the federal government had throughout
this pandemic, and so far they've dropped the ball.
Speaker 3 (02:34):
All right, I do three four, five six.
Speaker 1 (02:37):
And the explosive interview.
Speaker 6 (02:40):
Ministers those countries that you mentioned are looking at Australia
at the moment and laughing and saying that we have
got it wrong. You are the federal health minister. This
is a national health crisis. Have you considered resigning?
Speaker 1 (03:05):
For over a year, Sydney had been the luckiest of
capital cities. While COVID tour through the world, Sydney sauntered
to its mascless beat. When Melbourne went through months of lockdown,
Sydney barely suffered. But now, just as many other countries
were finally opening up, its luck ran out silently, and
(03:33):
suddenly the deadly Delta variant breached the city's defenses. Three
four left at three pm on June nine, FedEx Flight
seventy seven begins its final approach into Sydney. On the
streets below, a higher car driver from the city's east
(03:56):
is heading to the airport to pick up the crew
who avoid theuarantined red tape. Returning Australians have to go
through like army and police escorts instead waiting to take
them to their hotels. A state government supplied and approved
limousine drivers like this man.
Speaker 7 (04:15):
Welcome to Australia.
Speaker 6 (04:18):
Good luck to you and your family.
Speaker 1 (04:20):
We've chosen not to name him, but he has spoken
to us.
Speaker 3 (04:25):
A good right.
Speaker 1 (04:27):
He told us he was wearing a mask and yes
he was unvaccinated because of concerns over a family history
of blood cloths and health warnings about astrazenica. He was
in the queue for BISA, but despite being on the
front line, the sixty three year old driver wasn't fast tracked.
(04:48):
An inexcusable failure. That's not his fault.
Speaker 3 (04:54):
Yeah, I'll see you next time.
Speaker 2 (04:57):
People like limousine drivers, they were not prioritized and so
those people.
Speaker 8 (05:03):
Ended up not being vaccinated.
Speaker 2 (05:05):
We've been under the full solution that we were kind
of invulnerable to this virus to some extent with our
borders closed. But once the virus penetrates the border, as
it did in this instance, we then are no different
to anybody else.
Speaker 1 (05:25):
Flight FX seventy seven landed at three point thirty four PM.
Soon after the crew were tested for COVID, but the
results would not be known Immediately after the limo driver
dropped them to their hotel, he went home to his
wife at their Bondai apartment. She would be the next
(05:46):
to be infected. Fortress Sydney had just been breached.
Speaker 9 (05:54):
And now we're vulnerable because those borders aren't capable of
holding the virus back, no matter how much of it
and resource were put into that, and we're going to
end up being exposed when we're not yet ready.
Speaker 1 (06:10):
So why is it so dangerous? Why is not just
Sydney but Australia now so at risk. The delta variant
is the most contagious version of the coronavirus worldwide. It
spreads about two hundred and twenty five percent faster than
the original version of the virus.
Speaker 9 (06:34):
This is like fine sand that finds every even small
crack in the system.
Speaker 10 (06:41):
In the early stages of COVID, while its viral load
is still low, it's possible to have the virus and
test negative. Indeed, the first results from the FedEx flight
crew all came back negative. They stayed just one night
in Australia, but critically weren't swabbed a second time on
(07:02):
their way out. So why does New South Wales Health
believe it was one of the crew. Well, the genomic
sequence of the virus taken from the limo driver leaves
no doubt that it came from the US and they
were his point of contact.
Speaker 1 (07:30):
Initially, he showed no symptoms and was out and about.
He went to the Bell Cafe in Sydney's Ball Clues
and other cafes at Bondai Beach. He saw a movie
at a local cinema and shopped at Westville Bondai Junction,
one of the largest and busiest malls in Australia.
Speaker 9 (07:51):
We're seen in households the people passing the virus on
to others sixty percent high with this variant.
Speaker 1 (08:00):
The night before June fifteenth, the driver began suffering symptoms
after a restless sleep. He got up early so that
he and his wife could be among the first to
get tested that morning. The next day, the tests came
(08:22):
back positive. Soon after, contact traces plotted every place he'd
been to, and soon after that, within the New South
Wales government, reality.
Speaker 8 (08:34):
Hit Good morning everybody.
Speaker 1 (08:36):
At this point, preming a gladys Bereogiclian had a choice.
Option one, lockdown, hard and fast, or option two try
and manage it.
Speaker 4 (08:49):
She chose two, public safety first, but also keep the
economy open and our jobs going.
Speaker 1 (08:56):
Her light touch had kept the New South Wales open
for business throughout OVID and she hoped it would work again.
But initially Sydney was slack. Thirteen players title called divine lockdown.
NRL football is partied and hit under beds to avoid police.
Speaker 10 (09:13):
Having a party when you're not supposed to have a
party is not doing the right thing.
Speaker 1 (09:17):
The spread had started, but for many the message just
wasn't getting through.
Speaker 9 (09:23):
Yeah, something about this that makes people think that doesn't
apply to them. But you're contributing to something bigger than
your own health risk. Every time you put yourself at
risk in those around you, it is taking the virus
to your family, your friends, your connections, and we have
to actually recognize that unvaccinated, this is nothing like the flu.
(09:45):
Vaccination does the work of lockdowns and other things. Vaccination
turns the delta variant back into something much more benign.
Speaker 1 (09:55):
In any case, the light lockdown was too little, too late,
from zero cases to one every fifteen minutes, all in
a matter of days, from the cities east to west
and then down south all the way to Victoria. If
only Australia hadn't missed its opportunity when time was on
(10:18):
our side.
Speaker 3 (10:23):
We had the luxury of time.
Speaker 2 (10:25):
We saw everything unfold in the northern Hemisphere.
Speaker 3 (10:28):
We were at our sun.
Speaker 2 (10:30):
We could lock down our international borders. We did a
whole lot of things that could keep us safe.
Speaker 3 (10:36):
But we should never have.
Speaker 2 (10:38):
Allowed that luxury of time to translate into a sense
of non urgency about this virus.
Speaker 1 (10:46):
Ninety nine point five percent of COVID nineteen deaths in
the US in the past few months have been among
people who weren't vaccinated. Vaccines save lives. Our best protection
was never locked down, but vaccines.
Speaker 5 (11:03):
The fundamental mistake that was made last year was not
to procure enough vaccines.
Speaker 3 (11:09):
It is the worst failure of public.
Speaker 5 (11:11):
Administration I can recall. The mission should have been to
get as many vaccines as you can and get them
into the arms of Australians as quickly as possible. It
was only the single most important job the federal government had.
Speaker 1 (11:29):
Look at this graph. It shows the percentage of population
who have been double dosed in countries around the world,
thirty seven other countries before you get to Australia in
thirty eight and the last spot.
Speaker 5 (11:45):
You know, you can't say we couldn't get the vaccines
because other countries did.
Speaker 3 (11:54):
If I was in Australia, I'd be pretty upset.
Speaker 2 (11:57):
When we were offered advisor is now we did not
take that upright at the very beginning in the numbers
that we should have.
Speaker 11 (12:06):
I worry that cost might have been a factor of
the Pfizer vaccine is the most expensive of those out there.
Speaker 3 (12:12):
Having said that, I wonder how.
Speaker 11 (12:14):
Much the current lockdown is costing the government, how much
the government will have to spend in terms of COVID
relief funds.
Speaker 3 (12:23):
So it doesn't strike me as being a great decision.
Speaker 6 (12:29):
Should the Prime Minister have picked up the phone to
Fiser and made.
Speaker 3 (12:33):
An order, Certainly stuff like that helps.
Speaker 11 (12:36):
I've read that Benjamin Att Yahoo in Israel had thirty
separate conversations with the fires and CEO.
Speaker 2 (12:44):
These vaccines work, We've got.
Speaker 3 (12:47):
To get them fast.
Speaker 1 (12:54):
On do night, Sydney was Delta free nine one Limo
driver was infected. By July twelve, the city was not
only in lockdown, residents were now being locked up.
Speaker 10 (13:15):
It's your girlfriend that you're there with parto.
Speaker 12 (13:19):
So my name is and Angus form as.
Speaker 1 (13:35):
Ash and Angus live seven stories above ground zero, the
most dangerous block of flats in Australia. In this Bondi
Junction apartment complex, multiple people have tested positive for COVID
and have been transferred to quarantine all medical care. The
remaining residents are now locked in with police on guard outside.
(14:01):
What a difference a week makes.
Speaker 12 (14:03):
So Monday morning, I was up early to watch the
euro from twenty twenty five and I came out here
at halftime just to have a look over the city
as the sun was rising and stretched my legs with
here and I saw some police downstairs. And that's quite
taken it back as to what was going on and
how preciate it.
Speaker 3 (14:20):
I think it's one of those things that you just
think it's never going.
Speaker 1 (14:23):
To happen to me until it does.
Speaker 13 (14:25):
I actually got the text, and I think Ax was
in the shower at the time, and I remember walking
to the bathroom and just opening the shower door, and
same day it was COVID in the building.
Speaker 8 (14:35):
So I was shaking.
Speaker 1 (14:37):
It was scary.
Speaker 12 (14:40):
Yeah, it was scary.
Speaker 3 (14:42):
Good morning everybody.
Speaker 8 (14:43):
Yesterday we watched the press conference.
Speaker 10 (14:46):
At eleven and found out that rather than being two.
Speaker 12 (14:48):
Cases in the building was it was eight across five households.
Speaker 4 (14:52):
From my experience, you do not want to get it.
You seriously do not want to get it. It is
something that, no matter what your age and health and
fitness level, can really knock you around. Because it's certainly
knocked me around, that's for sure. So there were four
(15:19):
of us that went together for dinner, and I was
the only one of the four that actually contracted COVID nineteen.
Speaker 3 (15:25):
I'm still trying to work.
Speaker 4 (15:26):
Out how that actually happened.
Speaker 8 (15:28):
I was very careful, as we all were.
Speaker 4 (15:30):
We sat away from people in the restaurant, didn't brush
up against have any physical contact with anyone else in
the restaurant at all.
Speaker 8 (15:38):
We just weren't there that long. So how I got it.
Speaker 4 (15:42):
Is still a mystery, but it just highlights, I guess,
virulent and how contagious.
Speaker 8 (15:48):
This new variant, the Delta variant.
Speaker 4 (15:50):
Is.
Speaker 1 (15:53):
Adam Marshall getting the deadly Delta variant was no small thing,
not least because he could have crippled Parliament. You see,
by day twelve, COVID had entered the new South Wales Cabinet,
where Adam is Agriculture Minister. Like most Australians, he'd been
waiting his turn to be vaccinated. At first, the National
(16:16):
Party MP showed no symptoms.
Speaker 8 (16:20):
Parliament was sitting on the Tuesday. At that stage.
Speaker 4 (16:23):
Whilst I'd been exposed to COVID nineteen, I didn't have
the viral load in my system to have enough of
the virus to begin spreading it to other people.
Speaker 8 (16:33):
Thank goodness.
Speaker 4 (16:33):
If I'd have been spreading that to some of my
colleagues in Parliament, the results of that could have been catastrophic,
from the premiere all the way down. When it hit me,
it literally hit me. I felt fine, and then I
woke up and bang. It was literally like being run
over by a truck. And I was like that, laid
out flat for probably four or five days. This new
(16:58):
Delta variant, in my view, is very very strong. I've
had the flu, I've had colds. This was nothing like that.
Speaker 8 (17:06):
It was much much worse.
Speaker 3 (17:07):
How frightened, were you?
Speaker 4 (17:09):
I was quite worried at one point there. I remember
saying to myself, Look, if I wake up tomorrow and
I'm as bad as I am now or worse, I'm
I'm going to have to go to hospital. I probably
underestimated how very serious this new variant is, and certainly
(17:32):
going through that experience myself has made me more acutely
aware of how dangerous it is, how easy it is
to transmit, to be spread, and therefore for people to
catch it. Even if you have no physical contact with
people whatsoever, you can still catch it. And really it's
highlighted to me the importance of getting as many Australians
(17:55):
vaccinated as quickly as possible as we humanly can, because
being vaccinated is realistically the only true defense that we
have against this delta variant and any others that come
after it.
Speaker 1 (18:09):
Yet, even in this infected apartment block, where you'd think
emergency vaccinations would be a priority, the fearful weight goes on.
Speaker 6 (18:18):
Since the lockdown of the unit started. Has there been
any efforts from New South Wales Health or other departments
to get you guys vaccinated.
Speaker 3 (18:29):
That I've heard of today? To ask you a political question.
Speaker 6 (18:32):
There's a lot of criticism being directed towards the federal
government at the moment for those very low vaccine rates.
Have they stuffed up?
Speaker 8 (18:40):
They have stuffed up. Look, let's be frank. They do
need to should coade it.
Speaker 4 (18:43):
The national vaccination rollout has been an absolute shambles up
until this point. It's left Australians in a very vulnerable
position where we've got a very virulent and contagious strain
of COVID in our country and yet we have it
in the context of an Australian public that over ninety
percent are completely unvaccinated, so we are completely vulnerable and
(19:06):
at the mercy of this virus. I just think that's
not only disgraceful, it's also downright dangerous.
Speaker 1 (19:19):
Thirty two days after Flight FX seventy seven landed, the
government released this AD.
Speaker 4 (19:34):
I just think that ad was pointless at the moment
because people are keen to get jabbed, they.
Speaker 8 (19:41):
Just can't because there aren't enough doses, and so it
would have been better plowing that money.
Speaker 4 (19:46):
Into securing more doses more quickly so that we can
get jabbed.
Speaker 3 (19:50):
Authorized by the Australian government canbra.
Speaker 4 (19:53):
From my perspective, it strikes also the wrong message, even
if there were heaps of doses. The reason why we
want people to get vaccinated is because being vaccinated equals freedom.
It means that we don't have to have lockdowns or
any of these other draconian measures, because there will be
a level of protection in the community if everyone is vaccinated.
Speaker 1 (20:14):
Day one began with Delta on board. By day thirty six,
the deadly variant had gone viral, shutting down Australia's two
biggest cities, first Sydney and now Melbourne, which once again
is facing the strain and pain of lockdown and nerves
(20:36):
are framed far from the matting crowd in the quiet
of his electorate office. Australia's Health Minister Greg Hunt is
(20:57):
a man under pressure.
Speaker 3 (20:58):
And where we are for Greg one? Do three four
both seats?
Speaker 6 (21:03):
A little bit more of that question, Minister, Thank you
very much for your time. A pleasure if I could
begin by quoting the words of Adam Marshall, a coalition
minister in the new South Wales government, who we spoke
to earlier this week. The national vaccine rollout has been
an absolute shambles. It's not only disgraceful but dangerous. The
Commonwealth Government has dropped the ball. Your response to that.
Speaker 7 (21:26):
Well, as we speak, there will have been over nine
point six million people that have been vaccinated once or twice,
over nine point six million vaccinations, Minister.
Speaker 6 (21:37):
In terms of numbers tonight, one in two Australians is
in lockdown, one in ten is fully vaccinated. That sounds
like a failure to me.
Speaker 7 (21:46):
Well, no, with great respect, as we speak, it's thirty
four point five percent of Australians that have had vaccinations
on the popular.
Speaker 6 (21:55):
Romantics Minister, with respect, that's one dose of vaccine. The
numbers of Australia, the number of Australians that have had
actually roughly non semantics.
Speaker 7 (22:03):
It is the most fundamental and important figures and I
would ask you not to downplay the fact that over
a third of Australians have already had vaccination and that
is a critical protection.
Speaker 6 (22:15):
Australians are having to make up things on their registration
forms to get vaccines. I mean effectively they're being given
the choice of lying or dying. That is the reality.
They're so desperted for vaccines and they can't get this good.
Speaker 7 (22:28):
If you do have information, we would want you to
report it to us immediately.
Speaker 6 (22:32):
But is it good enough, sir, that they are feeling
that desperate? I mean tonight, in Sydney and Melbourne, the
two biggest cities in the country. Every pub and restaurant
is closed. People aren't earning an income, and there are
twenty year olds people in their twenties, I should say,
on ventilators in hospital in Sydney. Is that good enough?
Speaker 8 (22:49):
Well?
Speaker 7 (22:49):
Our goal is to have zero cases of community transmission
and zero lives loss. In the United Kingdom, there were
forty eight thousand cases in the last twenty four hours
as you and I are speaking, and sixty lives lost
in one day. So our circumstances are challenging in a
global pandemic, but our circumstances are so vastly different from
(23:12):
the experience of the overwhelming rest of the world.
Speaker 6 (23:16):
And yet ministers those countries that you mentioned are looking
at Australia at the moment and laughing and saying that
we have got it wrong. You are the federal health minister.
This is a national health crisis. Have you considered resigning?
Speaker 7 (23:30):
With great respect? Our task is to make sure that
we protect Australians. That's the fundamental thing. This week is
on track to be another record week of vaccination, but
it's a process that we have to go through to
bring forward as many Australians and that was always set
(23:51):
to occur over the course of twenty twenty one.
Speaker 6 (23:54):
Why didn't you pick up the phone to fires early
on an auto big.
Speaker 7 (23:58):
Well, we actually have secured forty million vaccines for Australia.
We've been able to bring forward additional vaccines earlier.
Speaker 6 (24:05):
You're making it sound like we're winning this race, but
if anybody is familiar with the figures, we're coming almost
dead last in terms of developed economies around the world
for vaccination rates. I mean, Malcolm Turnbull, your former boss,
who we spoke to earlier this week, says this is
his words, not mine. The federal government they've abjectly failed
and they've let Australia down. Your response, well.
Speaker 7 (24:27):
I respectfully disagree. Saving lives is the ultimate test. I mean,
I would ask you sometimes I imagine you're comparing us
to the UK. There were sixty lives lost in the
UK yesterday in one day, sixty souls gone from this earth.
And the test of everything that you're putting is the
(24:49):
comprehensive nature of all of the protections for a country.
Simple question, Taylor, do you think that sixty lives lost
is acceptable?
Speaker 6 (24:58):
I don't think any lives lost acceptable when they can
be avoided, not naturally, sir. So you're comparing us with
anyone to say anything to the contrary. But I'm not
in charge of I'm not in charge of vaccinating this country.
Speaker 7 (25:12):
You are correct, and that's exactly what's occurring.
Speaker 6 (25:15):
When was the last time you spoke to the CEO
of Pfizer.
Speaker 7 (25:19):
Well, that has been done both in writing and verbally.
The Prime Minister and I wrote in May that has
not been set out before previously because they had asked
us not to disclose it. As a consequence of that,
we were able to bring forward three million vaccines and
I'm happy to reveal that this evening that was not
(25:41):
previously disclosed, even though it was to our detriment not
talking about it, we did it. We achieved the outcome
for Australia. In addition to that, we have the Maderna
which is likely to start in September on our latest advice,
and novavaks the fifty one million do are likely to
be available in the final quarter of the year.
Speaker 6 (26:04):
Okay, minister, I really appreciate your time. Thanks for making
yourself available for us.
Speaker 7 (26:08):
Thanks Taylor.
Speaker 6 (26:22):
What's your message to Scott Morrison. I'm sure we'll be
watching as somebody who is quite clearly impacted by this
COVID lockdown. What would you like to say?
Speaker 8 (26:30):
I'd like to.
Speaker 13 (26:31):
Say that it'd be great to have some sort of
plan in place around vaccination rate, and you know, if
we get to eighty percent or whatever it might be,
this is what we will do at that point in time.
We will not put you know, lockdowns in place anymore
or whatever.
Speaker 3 (26:45):
Just having a plan to, having.
Speaker 13 (26:46):
A roadmap and having that sort of committed to would
be good.
Speaker 6 (26:51):
And now tell me about this famous sign plea's idea.
Speaker 3 (26:56):
If that is my idea.
Speaker 13 (26:58):
What we fight found was the couple will deliver us groceries.
Speaker 3 (27:01):
The calls won't deliver us alcohol.
Speaker 13 (27:03):
Because we need to show our ID and we can't
show our idea because we're in isolation.
Speaker 9 (27:07):
So we've been trying to figure out, yeah, what we're
going to do about.
Speaker 3 (27:12):
The vice of strange.
Speaker 12 (27:14):
What I think designed is just an example that whilst
this is a pretty terrible situation, that we are going
to kind of say so with a smile.
Speaker 6 (27:24):
Basically, we don't have enough people vaccinated. Is there an
approach we can take now that will speed things up?
Is there some way out of this that might right
the wrongs that we've previously committed.
Speaker 11 (27:37):
Look, I think you have to hold tight, help us
on the way. It won't be next week, but hopefully
in the coming weeks and months. By the end of
the year, you'll have people lighting up for all the
vaccine that you'll have.
Speaker 3 (27:49):
Is that's what we can hope for. The Radius VI
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