Australia’s biggest city is starting to live with Covid. Asia will be watching

That changed on Monday as Sydney, Australia’s largest city and the capital of New South Wales, emerges from a strict lockdown imposed in June to contain a Delta outbreak.McTighe said she’s “excited” to start her life again and see her loved ones, but she’s worried about what having Covid-19 in the community might mean for the city of 5.3 million people. “I think until everyone has a better understanding of this thing and how it keeps changing, we have to be concerned,” she said.National modeling from the Doherty Institute predicts that with “partial public health measures” and a 70% double vaccination rate, numbers could rise to 385,000 cases and 1,457 deaths over six months — more than Australia’s total toll over the entire pandemic. Greater vigilance could see those numbers drop, it added.Ahead of the reopening, Australia’s leaders have been careful to prepare their citizens for more deaths, casting it as the cost of getting back to normal life.But like Singapore, Australia has not ruled out reintroducing tighter restrictions if cases rise too quickly.Apart from Singapore and Australia, New Zealand, Thailand and Vietnam have all spoken about abandoning an elimination strategy. In some of those places, that has already prompted concern — in New Zealand, commentators have raised fears the move could spell disaster for the country’s most vulnerable. Experts said countries around the region will be looking to Sydney to see how successfully it moves to reopen — and to learn from its mistakes.And not only other countries — Morrison is keen to move ahead quickly with a nationwide reopening, and Australia’s other states and territories will have a close eye on NSW.Victoria, Australia’s second largest state, will likely be the next to reopen later in October.Paul Griffin, director of Infectious Diseases at Mater Health Services, said other governments would be particularly interested in how Sydney’s health system holds up after reopening.”I don’t think case numbers will be the key metric,” he said. “I think it will be markers of significant disease, and intensive care admission and, of course, the death rate.”If hospitals get overwhelmed by infections, and can’t perform normal services safely, that would be a “red flag,” he said.McTighe, the Sydney resident, said she still believes the original lockdown was necessary and doesn’t expect the reopening to necessarily be smooth — there might be a rise in cases and a reintroduction of restrictions, she said.But for now, she said she is very excited to live “a normal life again.” “You can see a bit of light at the end of the tunnel.”