'Don't Worry': Australian Min Jason Wood Reassures Indian Parents, Calls for Transparency from China

Australian MP and internal affairs Minister Jason Wood today said that Indian parents need not worry about their children who are currently residing in Australia, amid demands for their evacuation from the country.

In a conversation with News18, Wood shed some light on the Australian model for dealing with Covid-19; the country has managed to keep their number of cases under 10,000 and the number of deaths under 100.

Wood said that Prime Minister Scott Morrison's efforts amid coronavirus, ranging across the political spectrum as he dealt with various leaders can be attributed to the success.

'We've taken very strong advice from our Chief Medical officer, and some of our courses have been controversial -- one was to stop the international travel from China," he says.

Woods said that many countries criticised this decision, but in retrospect it was a good step to take. He also gave credit to Australia's "really big testing regime."

When asked about Indian students still in Australia, Wood says -- "we are treating your children just like our own, because we very much understand the situation on their end."

He reassures further, by saying that Australia's medical systems are state of the art. "If an international student needs to go the hospital to get that treatment, they will get that treatment."

We also have a very strong Indian community here, he said.

When asked about whether China needs to be held accountable for the coronavirus, Wood says -- Obviously, our PM has been leading the way, and all he is calling for is transparency."

"We've got a bad situation here, it's only fair to ask where did the virus come from?"

Australian-Chinese bilateral relations have soured in recent weeks after Morrison called for the inquiry into the origins of novel coronavirus.

Earlier, Morrison had said that Australia's calls for an independent inquiry into the origins of COVID-19 is "reasonable" and not targeted at any specific country.