(Bloomberg) -- Australia has suffered its worst day of coronavirus infections with Victoria state reportedly recording 723 new cases, dashing hopes that a lockdown in the city of Melbourne was bringing the outbreak under control.
The tally, reported by the Australian newspaper Thursday, eclipses the previous record by almost 200. State Premier Daniel Andrews will address the media at 11 a.m. local time and his office declined to comment on the report. Numbers had gradually decreased earlier this week, with the state recording 295 new cases on Wednesday, raising hopes the six-week lockdown of the city of 5 million people was working.
There are mounting concerns that the stay-at-home order in Melbourne, begun three weeks ago, will need to be extended and widened across other parts of the state, inflicting further damage on the economy. Health authorities also fear the virus is spreading to other states and territories, most of which have gone weeks without recording community transmissions.
The lockdown will be extended to the regional center of Geelong which lies an hour southwest of Melbourne by car, Sky News reported, without citing sources.
The Australian dollar fell 0.2% to 71.72 U.S. cents as investors sold the currency on reports of the spike in cases in Victoria.
Queensland state, which has closed its border to Victoria and the Greater Sydney area, is ramping up testing after two women who visited Melbourne didn’t self-isolate on their return and instead went to schools, restaurants and shopping centers for eight days unchecked before returning a positive result.
The resurgence in Victoria is taking a heavy toll on residents of age-care homes and is placing the health-care system under stress. The state said Tuesday it will suspend all but the most urgent elective surgeries in Melbourne as it seeks to free up hospital beds and nurses to fight a spike of cases in such facilities.
As of Wednesday, Victoria had 804 cases connected to age-care, and seven of the nine fatalities posted in the previous 24 hours were connected to the sector.
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