Anthony Albanese hinted this week the isolation time frame of seven days would be revisited by national cabinet, despite just last month saying it was not appropriate to reduce it. “Since we last met there’s been, fortunately, a reduction in the number of Covid infections and the impact that it’s having that was in accordance with the health advice we received. So we’ll be examining those issues,” the prime minister told 2SM radio on Tuesday.This week he also told the ABC: “Instead of the six states and two territories going different ways, we’re trying to get everyone on the same page”.His comments come after some of Australia’s state and territory leaders called for the isolation period to be reduced to allow people to return to work faster. NSW Premier Dominic Perrottet put forward a proposal to reduce the amount of time in isolation from seven to five days, and called for a nationally consistent approach. “We will naturally discuss and debate those things … and hopefully we will have a strong outcome,” he said, reports The Australian. His Victorian counterpart, Daniel Andrews, said it was the right time to be reconsidering the rules.“No one enjoys isolation; no one wants rules on any longs than they need to be,” he said.South Australian Premier Peter Malinauskas said he was “open-minded to this change, subject to the health advice”, and also stressed the need for “national consistency”.However, not everyone is convinced. Australian Capital Territory chief minister Andrew Barr was not in favour of changing the isolation period at this stage, saying any reforms might still be a month away. Other rules likely to feature at the Wednesday afternoon meeting will be whether to continue the isolation payments. The US has already moved to a five day isolation arrangement for infected people, down from seven. There were more than 12,000 new Covid-19 cases recorded on Tuesday, more than 4200 were from NSW and 2950 from Victoria. Both states recorded 55 deaths related to Covid-19. Since the pandemic started there have been more than 10 million Covid-19 cases reported and more than 13,800 deaths.
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