Virus damage drags Australia into recession for the first time in nearly 30 years

Australia is officially in its first recession for almost three decades, with the June quarter GDP numbers showing the economy went backwards by 7 percent, the worst fall on record.

The Bureau of Statistics numbers out today also confirmed the March quarter's 0.3 percent decline, meaning Australia's economy has gone backwards for two consecutive quarters, meeting a common definition of recession, ABC News reports

It is the first time this has happened since 1991, although the scale of the downturn is vastly greater than "the recession we had to have", where the economy shrank by 1.3 percent and 0.1 percent.

The 1991 recession was dubbed by then treasurer Paul Keating as "the recession we had to have.''