Victoria premier Dan Andrews has doubled down on his decision to send Melbourne into the world's longest lockdown in a media blitz of breakfast TV interviews.
The beleaguered Labor leader did back-to-back interviews on Today and Sunrise to defend his record as Victoria finally starts to re-open this week,
He rejected criticism of his lockdown policy that saw Melbourne forced into six shutdowns since the start of the pandemic.
By the time restrictions start to ease on Friday, the city will have endured a total of 262 days in lockdown, the most of anywhere on the planet.
But Mr Andrews insisted: 'Unless you want cases to race and have our hospital system completely overwhelmed, you have to use the tools available to you.'
Victoria premier Dan Andrews (pictured) has doubled down on his decision to send Melbourne into the world's longest lockdown in a media blitz of breakfast TV interviews
Mr Andrews said lockdowns were the only option before there was a vaccine and until it had been widely distributed throughout the population.
But with Victoria now close to reopening on Friday after hitting 70 per cent adult vaccine penetration, he promised a change of approach was coming.
'We have a vaccine now,' he told Nine's Today show. 'People have got that vaccine in record numbers. That means we're into a different phase now, normalising this.
'It's not a perennial suppression. We'll move through this difficult gateway and normalise this virus. Get our freedoms back. Repair the damage. Heal those wounds that are particularly considerable.
'But we will do that with the same sort of speed that Victorians have gone and got the jab.'
He defended his plan for staggered re-opening - which bizarrely sees hairdressers and nail salons opening up before indoor retail shops - as part of the process.
'This has to be done in a staggered way,' said Mr Andrews. 'They're difficult decisions to make.
'You can't do
