Apple Stores in Australia to re-close amid coronavirus resurgence

Apple this week will re-close at least four Apple Store locations in Victoria, Australia, due to a resurgence of coronavirus in the region.

The Cupertino tech giant updated its Australian retail website on Wednesday to reflect new information regarding store closures in the state of Victoria. Following limited operating hours today, Apple Chadstone, Apple Southland, Apple Doncaster and Apple Fountain Gate will re-shutter their doors in compliance with "stage 3" lockdown protocols enforced by Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews.

The four mall locations join a fifth Victoria outlet, Apple Highpoint, which was listed as temporarily closed last week.

Victoria has over the last two weeks experienced a spike in reported coronavirus cases, with positive tests reaching a new peak of 191 cases on Tuesday, reports The Guardian. The upward trend prompted Andrews to reinstitute a strict six-week lockdown scheduled to take effect at 11:59 p.m. on Wednesday, July 8.

Citizens in the capital of Melbourne, as well as those living in other densely populated areas, face a stay-at-home order that restricts public exposure to shopping for food and essential items, caregiving, daily exercise, and work and study, the report said. Shopping centers and select retailers can remain open if they follow occupancy guidelines, though it appears Apple is once again taking a conservative approach to the public health emergency.

The company proactively shut down retail operations outside of China in March in a bid to protect customers and team members from the fast-spreading virus. Apple Stores began to reopen in May as part of a phased return to normalcy, though flare ups have prompted re-closures.

9to5Mac reported on the upcoming Australian store closures earlier today.

The iPhone maker is following similar procedures in the U.S., where rampant spread of the virus forced the closure of nearly 80 stores across 14 states.

26 Comments

Rayz2016 8 Years · 6957 comments

About 4 years ago

Someone tweeted that we’ll keep seeing spikes and shutdowns until someone comes up with a vaccine.

But reading about some of these “I can’t breath if I wear a mask” folk being thrown out of shops … seems a lot of them are also anti-vaxxers. So now we have another problem.

As one ER Doctor pointed out, if you think you can’t breathe wearing a mask then you haven’t seen what COVID-19 can do to change your perspective on what “can’t breathe” really means.

sflocal 16 Years · 6138 comments

Anti-vaxxers have been out in full force preaching that they will never take the vaccine. I hope society in general penalizes them harshly. They are a danger to society.

badmonk 11 Years · 1336 comments

Rayz2016 said:

Someone tweeted that we’ll keep seeing spikes and shutdowns until someone comes up with a vaccine.
But reading about some of these “I can’t breath if I wear a mask” folk being thrown out of shops … seems a lot of them are also anti-vaxxers. So now we have another problem.

As one ER Doctor pointed out, if you think you can’t breathe wearing a mask then you haven’t seen what COVID-19 can do to change your perspective on what “can’t breathe” really means.

Agree, I was shocked by clip of the anti-mask sentiments of the West Palm Beachers at their city council meeting and how cult-like they sounded. Clearly this is part of the anti-vax, Q, anti-G5, UFO nuttiness.

I also think that we need to have a wide roll out of the Apple-Google contact tracing app and encourage its use. We need hyperlocal contact tracing much like what Dark Sky does for weather. I would prefer to encourage its use through positive means and not negative and of course people would need to quarantine if positive but ultimately you need to do whatever it takes.This is the only way to get the economy going.

mtriviso 17 Years · 20 comments

This is an excellent move by Apple. Keep those stores closed. That way people will not be able to go there to purchase Apple products. It's actually a brilliant marketing move and will probably save thousands of lives!

hammeroftruth 16 Years · 1356 comments

sflocal said:

Anti-vaxxers have been out in full force preaching that they will never take the vaccine. I hope society in general penalizes them harshly. They are a danger to society.

It’s called Darwinism, and you are seeing it in action.