Australia Prime Minister Scott Morrison on Friday announced a cut in foreign arrivals in the country by fifty percent to tackle a recent spike in COVID-19 cases in major cities.

With nearly half the country is under lockdown, Australia will limit overseas arrivals via commercial flights to 3,000 per week by mid-July, down from 6,000 per week as allowed under the current ‘zero COVID’ strategy, AFP reported.

The government will also ramp up its private repartriation flights simultaneously. All arrivals will have to undergo two weeks of mandatory quarantine. 

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With half the country’s population placed under lockdown snap lockdowns, there have been growing frustration around the country’s handling of the virus lately. Outbreaks have been linked to leaky hotel quarantine measures while critics have also highlighted a “vaccine stroll out” as a reason for the failure to control the infection. 

More than 18 months into the pandemic, less than eight percent of adults have been fully vaccinated.

“This is a difficult time when people are dealing with restriction,” Morrison said. “There is still quite a journey ahead of us.”

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Sydney and Brisbane — home to around 10 million people combined — remain in lockdown in an effort to suppress outbreaks that delivered 27 new local cases on Thursday.

Although shutdowns are being lifted in Alice Springs, Darwin, Perth and Queensland’s Gold Coast, the clusters continue to grow, particularly in Sydney.

There, a Bondi cluster has infected 188 people since being discovered on June 16.

Reaction to the tighter border restrictions was mixed, with the opposition centre-left Labor welcoming the move, but human rights groups expressing concern.

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“This reduction in international arrivals is devastating news for the more than 34,000 Australians still stranded overseas and their families,” said Sophie McNeill of Human Rights Watch.

“Australia has heavily restricted entry of its own citizens in a way that no other democratic nation has. But we need to remember that all Australians have a right of return to their own country.”

Trying to address growing anger at the prospect of border restrictions stretching into a second year, Morrison previewed a “new deal” that would shift the country’s strategy from suppressing coronavirus to managing it.

The government, he said, would soon adopt a series of vaccination targets which, when reached, would allow the gradual opening of borders and a return to normal life.

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He indicated borders would open first for vaccinated Australians and overseas travellers, who could also be subject to reduced quarantine requirements.

The vaccination targets are likely to be set by scientific advisors rather than politicians.

“If you get vaccinated, you get to change how we live as a country, you get to change how you live in Australia,” Morrison said.

Before the pandemic began, around 260,000 people entered Australia each week, and citizens were free to travel overseas.