Image: Burnet Institute Director and CEO Professor Brendan Crabb AC on ABC's 7.30 program

The case for more stringent measures to contain the spread of COVID-19 in Australia was a special focus for Burnet Institute Director and CEO Professor Brendan Crabb AC on ABC’s 7.30 program on Monday.

“The approach that the government and officials are taking at the moment is a reasonable approach, and they’re very good at their job and I understand why they’re doing it,” Professor Crabb said.

“But it is the moment in time, and the only moment we’ll have to be having this debate and I would like it to be had, and I would like it to be had in the open.

“This is not some maverick left-field idea, this is a mainstream approach, to go hard when numbers are at their lowest.”

Professor Crabb described the ‘go hard, go early’ approach as standard pandemic practice in circumstances where the tools to do all the necessary contact tracing in the community are not available.

He said suppression-mode restrictions would buy the community the time it needs to develop those tools and use them effectively.

Watch the full interview below.

Professor Crabb also spoke on ABC Radio.