COVID-19

Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga said that although infection were falling they remained high, and that some hospitals were still under strain

Restriction will be in place until 19 June, five weeks before the postponed Tokyo 2020 Olympics are due to start.

Organisers said they would wait until the emergency ends on 20 June to decide whether to allow local fans to attend.

Overseas fans have already been barred.

The lockdown will begin at midnight on Thursday (14:00 GMT).

Authorities have so far found 26 cases, and identified 150 sites where people may have been exposed to the virus.

There is growing anxiety over the outbreak which reminds many locals of a devastating second wave that swept the state last year.

Victoria's acting Premier James Merlino said the outbreak involved a highly contagious strain of the virus, the B.1.617 variant. A returned traveller was infected with the strain, which Mr Merlino said was spreading "faster than we have ever recorded".

That's in large part thanks to the early move to shut its borders - a policy that has consistently been supported by the public.

But after a year in the cocoon, there is growing unease in the country over the so-called "Fortress Australia" policy.

Recent announcements declaring that Australia won't open up until mid-2022 - meaning a two year-plus isolation - have amplified concerns.

A year ago, 42% (143 respondents) expected to return to pre-COVID revenue levels by 2021, reflecting at the time improved confidence in a more positive outlook. This is in comparison to the most recent survey, where 12 % (106 respondents), remain confident of returning to pre-COVID revenue in 2021 and 50% expecting it in 2022 or later.

The cases are members of one household in Muanikoso, Nasinu.

One of these cases is an employee of Extra Supermarket.

So all five of these cases have been under home quarantine following the discovery of that cluster last week. Contact tracing investigations are ongoing.

The Ministry of Health said their contact tracing for a case announced yesterday from the Vunimono/Nadali cluster has identified him as being a potentially high-risk case for transmission.

He is a driver for a security company and was working up until Wednesday, 19 May.

The show follows a family’s struggles escalated in 2020 and how everything changed overnight due to the global coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.

The main character Esta is played by Virana T Davis.

She is a typical, hardworking Ni-Vanuatu woman and a mother of two children- played by Helen Kailo & Carina Apia.

Esta’s partner Donald is played by Michael R Maki, who is a typical Ni-Vanuatu man.

The Australian carrier also said it would report an annual loss before tax of more than $1.5bn (A$2bn, £1.1bn).

But it added that its debt pile had peaked and was likely to fall as domestic travel was on track to hit pre-pandemic levels.

Qantas said its international division was losing about $2.3m a week, down from $3.9m last month.

Its latest cost-cutting plans include a two-year wage freeze, slashing travel agents' commissions for international flights and offering voluntary redundancies to cabin crew in its international business.

The death toll is expected to rise as rescue operations continue. At least 53 people are still missing.

A navy warship returned to the city's harbour on Wednesday with some of the 186 survivors rescued so far.

Thirty-five people have also been rescued from another of the three other barges stranded due to cyclone Tauktae.

The cyclone weakened after it made landfall on Monday, but at least 19 people are confirmed as having died on land in the storm.

Govind Kant, a Sydney businessman, died on Sunday, his company said.

He had travelled to Delhi in April for family reasons.

Mr Kant is believed to be the second Australian to have died in India amid a temporary travel ban imposed after a devastating second wave. Australian officials are yet to comment.

The three-week ban on Indian arrivals ended on Saturday, but more than 9,000 Australians remain stuck in the country.

They all are from a cluster in the Nadali area of Nausori, near Fiji's capital Suva, a region of the country where a four day lockdown is due to end tomorrow morning.

The new cases bring the number of active cases of Covid-19 in the country to 55. Of these, only four are classified as border cases.

The Health Secretary James Fong announced the new cases tonight, saying that over 2,500 tests for the virus had been conducted in the past day.