Australia Considers Return Of Foreign University Students

NSW state allows people to resume travel for pleasure; for the first time in 800 years, UK’s Cambridge University scraps in-person lectures for 2020-2021

Australian officials announced a raft of plans on Wednesday to speed up the resumption of public life to boost the ailing economy amid a diplomatic spat with major trading partner China.

The government is also talking with Australian universities about allowing the return of some international students, a sector that contributes more than A$30 billion ($19.6 billion) to domestic coffers.

New South Wales (NSW), the country’s most populous state, will allow people to resume recreational travel from next month, effectively reopening tourist regions on its southern coast that were badly damaged by huge bushfires before the epidemic.

“We want people to enjoy themselves, to feel free, but at the same time please know that nothing we do is the same during a pandemic,” NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian said.

Australia has reported just over 7,000 infections, including 100 deaths, and has completed around 1.1 million tests among its population of 25 million. Health Minister Greg Hunt said just 11 new cases were logged over the past 24 hours.