SYDNEY, Dec. 8 (Xinhua) -- The vast majority of Australians were reported being satisfied with their government's response to COVID-19, a new survey revealed Tuesday, with nine out of ten people in major states saying they agreed with the actions taken.
Researchers at the University of Technology Sydney (UTS) surveyed roughly 5,000 people from Australia's eastern states as well as Australians in New Zealand, Canada, the United States and Britain in late November.
Respondents in the Australian States of New South Wales and Queensland reported higher levels of satisfaction than those in the State of Victoria which was recently at the center of Australia's second wave of infections.
Roughly 90 percent of respondents in NSW and Queensland agreed with the Australian government's handling of COVID-19.
Residents of New Zealand (67 percent) were less enthusiastic about their governments' response, although fared better than Canada (64 percent), England (51 percent) and the United States (39 percent).
"We see that in relative terms the state and Federal governments' management continues to be viewed as more effective in the eyes of the people living in Australia than other parts of the world," said co-author of the survey, Associate Professor Paul Burke, from UTS' Business Intelligence & Data Analytics (BIDA) group.
Australia recorded just seven new cases of COVID-19 on Monday, all of which were contracted overseas and tested positive after arriving in hotel quarantine.
Meanwhile, the country's death toll stood at just over 35 people per million according to Oxford University backed figures, compared with 903 deaths per million in Britain and 852 in the United States.
The relatively low infection rate meant that Australia was able to reopen its domestic borders and significantly reduce COVID-19 restrictions on businesses and individuals in the lead up to Christmas, leaving residents free to mark the occasion however they chose alongside family and friends. Enditem
