LATEST COVID-19 DEVELOPMENTS:
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
* Dozens of Australians will not be returning home on the first post-pause flight out of India after they tested positive to COVID-19.
* It is understood more than 40 people tested positive before boarding the repatriation flight, which is due into Darwin on Saturday morning.
* Adding close contacts of the passengers, more than 70 missed out on boarding an aircraft with COVID-safe capacity of 150 seats.
* The suspension of flights from India ends at midnight on Friday.
* Prime Minister Scott Morrison said the controversial two-and-a-half-week-long 'pause' had worked, with active cases of COVID-19 in hotel quarantine dropping by more than 40 per cent.
* The government has ordered 25 million doses of Moderna vaccines, giving its rollout a shot in the arm.
* The vaccine rollout to Victorians aged under 50 will gather pace from next week, with priority groups eligible for the Pfizer jab.
* From Monday, Victorian emergency service workers, defence force personnel, meat industry workers, people with underlying health conditions or severe mental ill-health will be able to get a Pfizer dose.
* A majority of Australians believe a COVID-free world is at least five years away and support a partial reopening of borders in the meantime, according to a new survey.
* The research comes as the University of Sydney, backed by former NSW premier Mike Baird, ups its pressure on the federal government in a new report arguing international students - worth more than $40 billion nationwide - should be allowed to return.
* Transport authorities have contacted just over a third of the people who were travelling on trains with Melbourne's latest coronavirus case.
* The Queensland government says it is taking smaller COVID-19 vaccine deliveries because more supplies are going directly to GPs.
AUSTRALIAN VACCINATION NUMBERS:
* There were 2,980,644 doses administered in the national COVID-19 vaccination rollout up to Thursday, including 85,874 in the previous 24 hours.
* Of the total, 1,938,916 have been administered by the Commonwealth (an increase of 57,407 in the previous 24 hours).
* 1,651,124 have been issued in primary care (+49,601) and 287,792 in aged and disability facilities (+7806).
* 1,041,728 have been administered by the states and territories, including 28,467 in the previous 24 hours.
* 299,397 have been administered in Victoria (+8533), 266,514 in NSW (+10,321), 167,119 in Queensland (+2424), 124,985 in Western Australia (+2916), 76,788 in South Australia (+1551), 47,921 in Tasmania (+1083), 37,039 in the ACT (+756) and 21,965 in the NT (+883).
AUSTRALIAN CORONAVIRUS NUMBERS:
* Australia reported no new locally acquired virus cases on Friday. There were two new overseas-acquired cases: one in NSW and one in Victoria.
* The national death toll is 910: Victoria 820, NSW 56, Tasmania 13, WA 9, Queensland 7, SA 4, ACT 3 (Two Queensland residents who died in NSW have been included in the official tolls of both states).
GLOBAL CORONAVIRUS NUMBERS:
* Cases: at least 161,188,177
* Deaths: at least 3,344,757
Data current as of 1800 AEST on May 14, taking in federal and state/territory government updates and Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Centre figures.
Australian Associated Press
