Covid in Sydney: Communities feel under siege as troops deployed

"If the objective was to frighten the hell out of the community, I can guarantee you they have done that."

Dai Le, a local councillor in Sydney, is speaking angrily about the deployment of 300 military personnel to the city's streets this week.

Her constituency, Fairfield, is one of eight areas in Sydney considered the epicentre of Australia's biggest Covid outbreak in a year.

These poorer and ethnically diverse suburbs in Sydney's west and south west are home to about two million residents. Many are considered essential workers in food, health and other industries.

The soldiers arrive almost a month after police deployed an extra 100 officers to the area to enforce lockdown rules.

"I feel we've been treated like second-class citizens," Ms Le says.

"They have killed people's confidence, they have triggered so much fear. What is this message? What is it doing to a community that's already under siege?"

As Sydney scrambles to contain a Delta outbreak that has grown to more than 4,000 active cases and 27 deaths, these suburbs have been put under harsher restrictions than elsewhere.

A citywide lockdown will last until at least 28 August. But unlike other Sydneysiders, these residents have been told to wear masks even outdoors. They cannot travel more than 5km (three miles) when leaving home for essential reasons, less than the 10km afforded to others. There are also stricter limits on who can work.