A whole bunch of lives may very well be saved if extra was finished proper now to restrict the unfold of COVID-19, a Victorian parliamentary inquiry has been instructed.
On Thursday, the committee heard from epidemiologist Margaret Hellard from the Burnet Institute, who warned Australia was more likely to surpass 10,000 COVID-19-related deaths this yr.
"That is my view and that is method too excessive," she mentioned.
"That's far increased, folks want to know, than the usual deaths we might have had associated to flu, in any unhealthy yr."
Since Monday, there have been 55 deaths reported in Victoria.
Infectious illnesses specialists akin to Epidemiologist Nancy Baxter instructed the inquiry that political expediency is trumping public well being.
"No one on the prime desires to be seen in a masks," she mentioned.
"They need the pandemic to be over.
"Not less than having an sincere dialog that we might must convey one thing like masks again, would at the least put together folks, so if we do must, it is not some shock for them."
Hellard mentioned Australia may keep away from 1000's of COVID-19 infections if the general public took measures to scale back the unfold of the virus.
"It is not simply an all-or-nothing strategy, I do not suppose our management is pretty much as good because it may very well be," she mentioned.
"This notion that, 'oh, they might get sick and die anyway', that is not the case.
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"We're coming into waves, you are able to do easy mixtures of issues that may scale back transmission and save lives."