Australia will keep its borders closed for at least another three to four months as it believes it would be “risky” to ease travel restrictions in light of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, according to the country’s chief medical officer on Thursday.

“We’ve just recommended to the National Cabinet that we continue the very restrictive bans on Australians basically leaving the country unless there are exceptional circumstances, or anyone except Australian citizens coming back,” Brendan Murphy said.

The government issued a maximum Level 4 travel alert on account of the COVID-19 pandemic, prohibiting Australians from travelling abroad and subsequently closed its borders to foreign nationals, with the exception of residents and citizens.

Australia will begin to progressively relax its restrictions with the resumption of some non-urgent surgical procedures and the partial reopening of some popular beaches from next week.

Classes in schools will also start to resume gradually in some states and the Australian government is scheduled to review whether to resume some essential activities from May 11 although social distancing measures are expected to remain in place for a year.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison said the easing of certain measures implemented due to the pandemic would affect activities that are “low health risk and more high economic value”.

Earlier, the country passed the government’s wage subsidy scheme, deemed by Prime Minister Scott Morrison as “the biggest economic lifeline” in the history, as a response to deal with the impact of the coronavirus pandemic.

On April 3, the states have closed their borders in an effort to curb the spread of the virus.

Meanwhile, the northeastern state of Queensland also tightened border restrictions with its neighbour New South Wales (NSW), denying entry to anyone without a valid reason.

In March, the country had announced a nearly US$100 million boost in funding to tackle domestic violence after support services reported a spike in coronavirus-related family abuse.

With 336 cases of unknown origin, NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian said laws restricting public gatherings and limiting people leaving their homes could be in place for as long as six months, and did not rule out extending that period if health experts recommended to do so.

Earlier, PM Morrison said the Aus$150 million boost — part of an additional Aus$1.1 billion in health-related spending announced— would be spent on telephone support services for both domestic violence victims and abusers.

Australia has recorded 6,649 COVID-19 cases, including 74 deaths and 4,761 people who have recovered from the disease.

More than 1,80,000 people in the world have died from the novel coronavirus, nearly two-thirds of them in Europe, since it emerged in China last December, according to an AFP tally based on official sources.