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| The country has also imposed new restrictions blocking travel from nine southern African countries. The trio scaled a fence at the Howard Springs quarantine centre near Darwin. (Photo by= Getty Images) |
[Asia News = Reporter Reakkana] Australian police have arrested three people who broke out of a Covid quarantine compound in the middle of the night. BBC reported that the Howard Springs center near Darwin in the Northern Territory is one of Australia's main quarantine facilities for people returning to the country.
Police said the trio scaled a fence to break out of the facility. Officers found them after a manhunt on Wednesday. All had tested negative to Covid the day before. Officials didn’t state whether the escapees were returning travelers or locals in quarantine. Recently, the center has also housed people infected from a Covid outbreak in Katherine, a town 300km (185 miles) away. Police had set up checkpoints around the compound on Wednesday and inspected cars moving through the area.
Last Friday, a 27-year-old man jumped the center's fences and fled in a waiting car to Darwin's town center. He was later arrested and tested negative for Covid-19. Up to 2,000 people can be held at the Howard Springs site. One case of the Omicron variant has been confirmed there, a traveler from South Africa who arrived on 25 November. Omicron cases have also been detected in Sydney. Australia has delayed reopening its international borders until mid-December, amid concerns about the variant. Early evidence suggests it has a heightened re-infection risk.
