Meanwhile in Birdsville, in outback Queensland, a police officer is doing his part to keep local businesses afloat ... by moonlighting as a pizza delivery driver. I decided to give the officer in charge at Birdsville police station, senior constable Stephan Pursell, a ring, and he told me it was true. Once he knocks off his shift at the station this evening, he will become a delivery driver for the Birdsville Hotel, an iconic venue in the town that has been left struggling due to the virus. As the only person manning Birdsville Police Station, Pursell has one of the most remote jobs in the country. The town is on the edge of the Simpson Desert, almost 1,600 kilometres west of Brisbane. In summer, it reaches temperatures upwards of 45 degrees celsius. “So in some ways, the town is used to isolation,” Pursell tells me. “We go into summer trading mode from December through to March, and everyone kind of bunkers down until the heat is over.” But once the heat starts to ease off the town relies of tourists coming through to support businesses like the iconic Birdsville Hotel. With Coivd-19 lockdowns and shutdowns underway, the town has lost a lot of that business. “So I thought I’d deliver pizzas for the hotel as a bit of a novelty and also to show my support and help them out,” Pursell, who is originally from Victoria, says. “This is a small close community and I’m in a position to do it, and it’s something different I can do to help. But importantly for me, it gives me a chance to check in on people and make sure they’re going okay. I hope it provides something a bit fun for the community during these hard times.” His top pizza pick? “I’m a meat-lovers fan, all the way.” Cases in Victoria reach 1,319 The latest figures for Victoria have just come in. The state’s health minister, Jenny Mikakos ,says there are 1,319 cases, including 14 deaths. There are 136 cases that may indicate community transmission has occurred. There are 30 people in hospital, including 12 in intensive care. Meanwhile 1,172 people have recovered and more than 79,000 Victorians have been tested. In these extraordinary times, the Guardian’s editorial independence has never been more important. Because no one sets our agenda, or edits our editor, we can keep delivering quality, trustworthy, fact-checked journalism each and every day. Free from commercial or political bias, we can report fearlessly on world events and challenge those in power. Your support protects the Guardian’s independence. We believe every one of us deserves equal access to accurate news and calm explanation. No matter how unpredictable the future feels, we will remain with you, delivering high quality news so we can all make critical decisions about our lives, health and security – based on fact, not fiction. Support the Guardian from as little as $1 – and it only takes a minute. Thank you. My colleague Michael McGowan reports that many of the services Sydney’s rough sleepers rely on have disappeared in the Covid-19 lockdown. But others have adapted, like the Wayside Chapel in Sydney’s Kings Cross. McGowan writes: Like everything else, an average day at the chapel has been turned on its head in the past month. Where usually the not-for-profit homelessness service’s famous rabbit-warren headquarters in the Cross would be a hive of activity until late into the night, now the doors are locked and the building near-empty. Outside, the people who still rely on the services Wayside has been offering since the mid-1960s mill around; they charge their phones, wait to speak to counsellors about temporary housing or simply try to avoid the police. Hazel, in her 20s and homeless, hasn’t received her usual disability pension. She is “very, very short” on money: “Most of my street family have gone into housing since all this, so I’m on my own. It’s very hard. I just sleep anywhere. I don’t know what I’ll do if it doesn’t come soon.” In sport news Australian cricketers Glenn Maxwell and James Faulkner are the latest to lose English county cricket contracts because of uncertainty over coronavirus. AAP reports the international allrounders were due to represent Lancashire during the domestic T20 Blast competition but the club announced on Friday that overseas deals would be terminated because of uncertainty over when cricket in England would resume. The England and Wales Cricket Board initially put the season on hold until at least 28 May but uncertainty remains about whether there will be further interruptions. New Zealand Test wicketkeeper-batsman BJ Watling has also had his red-ball deal terminated. The ECB still hope the vaunted Hundred competition will be able to start on 15 July, but there have been calls for it to be postponed until 2021, with tickets sales suspended and players such as David Warner withdrawing. Australia Test spinner Nathan Lyon’s red ball contract with Hampshire was also terminated last week. Just looking globally for a minute, researchers at Johns Hopkins University say more than 2.2 million people have been confirmed as having contracted the virus worldwide. Their data shows at least 153,00 have died. Italy’s total death toll has risen to 22,745, the Civil Protection Agency said, the second highest in the world after the US. The US daily coronavirus death toll hit a new record. According to the Wall Street Journal, 4,591 Americans died over the 24 hours to Thursday, nearly doubling the record of 2,569 that was set on Wednesday. The country’s total death stands at 34,614. Meanwhile, 14,576 people have died in the UK. Aged-care residents and staff in Tasmania to get test results In further aged-care home developments, hundreds of residents and staff at three nursing homes in north-west Tasmania are expected to get their Covid-19 test results on Saturday, AAP reports. The state government issued blanket testing across the Melaleuca nursing home in east Devonport, the Eliza Purton home in Ulverstone, and Coroneagh Park in Penguin after the discovery that a healthcare worker had done shifts at all three facilities before testing positive for coronavirus. The person also worked at two closed hospitals in Burnie at the centre of the outbreak, which is linked to almost 100 of the state’s 184 cases. The prime minister, Scott Morrison, claimed on Friday the healthcare worker in question had been dishonest about their contacts, but state authorities later said this was inaccurate. Tasmania’s total number of coronavirus cases is 184, with four more in the north-west region added on Friday evening. Tasmania has had seven deaths. Good morning, Melissa Davey with you for another Saturday of Australia Covid-19 coverage and curve-flattening news. To recap the latest, the national death toll rose on Friday to 65. The latest deaths include a 72-year-old Tasmanian man, and a 42-year-old man who was a crew member on the Artania cruise ship died in Perth. The 42-year-old became the youngest person in Australia to die from the virus. Meanwhile an aged-care home in NSW has grappled with a major outbreak throughout the past week. Thirty staff and residents at the Anglicare Newmarch House have tested positive for Covid-19. It has prompted health authorities to test every staff member and resident, including those who already tested negative. As my colleague Josh Taylor explains in this piece, the prime minister has not ruled out making a Covid-19 tracking app mandatory. The Australian government is planning to launch an app in a matter of weeks which will trace every person who has been in contact with a mobile phone owner who has tested positive for coronavirus in the previous few weeks. This is in a bid to automate coronavirus contact tracing, and allow restrictions to be eased. Josh has answered some of your questions about the app in his piece. In business news, the federal government announced on Friday it would spent $165m to underwrite Qantas and Virgin to conduct domestic flights for at least eight weeks. In upsetting news, a database collecting racist incidents against Asian Australians has received 178 responses in two weeks – roughly 12 incidents a day. Queensland police also condemned a rise in anti-Asian racism that has led to 22 criminal charges of racially motivated offences in the state. As Jason Yat-sen Li writes: “There is one area of civic discourse where we are letting ourselves down, and that is the marked uptick in racial abuse of Asian Australians.” Meanwhile the Australian Indigenous Doctors’ Association issued a media release detailing occasions of medical practitioners denying Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders access to culturally safe healthcare seeking testing for Covid-19. These cases in rural NSW and Western Australia involved medical practitioners refusing Covid-19 related healthcare on the grounds of patient identity and racist stereotypes of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders not practising self-hygiene. Let me know if I miss anything throughout the day over at Twitter or by emailing melissa.davey@theguardian.com. As always, be nice, especially to each other. On Friday morning an Anglicare spokesman said 10 staff and 20 residents at the western Sydney Anglicare Newmarch House aged-care facility had Covid-19, a doubling in cases associated with the home in 24 hours. The aged care quality and safety commission issued a statement overnight, saying it was involved in discussions with representatives from the NSW office of the federal health department and the NSW public health unit. “These discussions are focusing on ensuring that the service receives appropriate support to assist its management of the evolving situation in relation to the Covid-19 outbreak, and to concentrate on ensuring the safety and wellbeing of residents at the service,” a spokeswoman said. Matthew Fowler’s 87-year-old father is in Newmarch House and returned a negative test for Covid-19 earlier in the week. But Fowler told Guardian Australia he had been retested on Friday along with all the other residents. Fowler said he wanted infection control procedures at the home reviewed. He has also made a complaint to the aged care quality and safety commission.