MELBOURNE (Reuters) – Sydney will enter a hard two-week lockdown on Saturday night as authorities try to contain a fast-spreading outbreak of the highly infectious Delta coronavirus variant in Australia\u2019s largest city, the state premier said.<\/p>\n
More than a million people in downtown Sydney and the city\u2019s eastern suburbs were already under lockdown due to the outbreak, but health authorities said they needed to expand that after more COVID-19 cases were recorded, with exposure sites increasing beyond the initial areas of concern.<\/p>\n
The lockdown, announced by New South Wales state Premier Gladys Berejiklian, will also include the regions of Blue Mountains, Central Coast and Wollongong, which surround Sydney.<\/p>\n
The curbs on Sydney, home to more than five million people, are the latest in a streak of short but hard lockdowns that have been imposed in Australia\u2019s cities in recent months to fight small outbreaks of the coronavirus.<\/p>\n