Multicultural festivals across Australia are among a range of major events cancelled as fears over the spread of COVID-19 grow.
The Federal Government has advised against holding mass gatherings involving more than 500 people from Monday on the advice of the chief medical officer.
Even before the government issued the advice, several major multicultural festivals had decided not to go ahead with events planned this month.
The Parramasala Festival in Sydney's west was set to take place this weekend, but organisers have postponed the event citing the "safety and wellbeing of our communities".
Organisers of Brisbane’s Paniyiri Greek Festival have also announced the cancellation of this year’s event in May, usually attended by about 50,000 visitors.
Committee chair Chris Kazonis said they had been monitoring the outbreak since February, keeping in close contact with state health authorities.
He said the decision to call it off was made to protect the health of the wider community as well as the festival’s volunteers, citing modelling showing the outbreak would be at its peak in Queensland during April and May.
“There are a whole number of volunteers that we have that are mature age people, we’ve got some old Greek ladies cooking sweets and doing this and doing that,” Mr Kazonis told SBS News.
“We just couldn’t afford for any of them personally contracting the virus.”
The event has been in planning for almost a year and attracts visitors from across Australia, with celebrity chef Miguel Maestre among the high-profile guests booked to attend.
Greek Paniyiri in Brisbane Source: SBS Radio Greek
Now it won’t take place until 2021 leaving organisers and community stakeholders facing a sizeable financial loss.
“The charity groups, they’ll miss out on quite a bit of money,” Mr Kazonis said.
“Our groups fundraise for nursing homes, health and respite services. But what we’re comfortable about is all the feedback has been positive.”
Persian NY celebrations off
The Iranian-Australian community has been scaling back Persian New Year celebrations as it grapples with the impact of the government's international travel ban on Iran, which has been in place for over a fortnight.
Mohammadreza Shama, president of the Iranian Society of Queensland, said the travel ban came as a big shock to the community, with some members encountering negative treatment as a result.
“It affected Iranian society and Iranian people [and] it creates some bad feelings about the role of Iranians in spreading the virus in Australia,” he told SBS News.
I hear lots of complaints from parents that their children's friends do some kind of bullying because they feel they are Iranian and there is a possibility of being infected by coronavirus.
He said organisers made the decision to cancel events in Queensland partly as a display of goodwill.
“It’s better that we cancel the event to avoid any kind of misunderstanding for other communities and the big community of Australian people,” he said.
“Our members are happy with this decision as it gives a message to the Australian community that Iranian people care about public health more than anything”
'Public health before profits'
UNSW researcher Bill Bowtell led Australia’s response to the HIV epidemic in the 1980s.
While the government has stopped short of recommending sporting matches be called off or schools close, Mr Bowtell said has called for all major events to be shut down.
"The Americans have figured that out, they've shut down the NBA, the soccer, the hockey, the baseball, Broadway and Disneyland," he told SBS News.
"They're doing it to protect the public health. They're putting public health before profits."
Mr Bowtell has also been critical of the response from authorities, calling for an expansive public awareness campaign to reach out to Australians from all backgrounds and languages.
NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian listens as Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison speaks during the COAG meeting in Sydney. Source: AAP
"We cannot allow this thing to ramp up in the way that overwhelmed and engulfed Italy and is overwhelming and engulfing Denmark."
Prime Minister Scott Morrison has sought to reassure Australians that the government is managing the response to coronavirus carefully.
"We are taking an abundance of caution approach, which is what we have all the way through," he told reporters in Sydney.
"What we are seeking to do is to lower the level of overall risk, and at the same time ensure that we minimise any broader disruption that is not necessary at this stage to engage in."
