Greater Sydney and surrounds are expected to remain in lockdown for another week as the Berejiklian government buys more time to contain an outbreak that still has a high risk of community transmission.
It’s being widely reported that the NSW government’s Crisis Cabinet Committee which met on Tuesday has decided to extend the lockdown until 11.59pm on July 16.
The two-week shutdown had originally been due to end midnight this Friday.
The decision comes as the number of new cases who had spent time in the community while infectious continued to alarm health experts, including seven of the new cases announced on Tuesday.
Chief Health Officer Dr Kerry Chant has previously flagged that the lockdown’s success would be judged on this metric.
NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian is expected to announce the prolonged lockdown on Wednesday morning which will include students in the lockdown zones learning from home when school resumes next week.
Regional NSW students will return to classrooms as normal.
Ms Berejiklian spent most of Tuesday locked in meetings with health experts so she could tell the lockdown-fatigued community “what next week looks like”.
“While we have the best contact tracers in the world, and I believe the right settings at the right time for our population, we have to be mindful that what we are experiencing with this strain is something new during the pandemic,” she said.
“It is not something we have seen before, and that is why it requires a different type of response.”
Ms Berejiklian is also expected to unveil in coming days a longer-term strategy to ensure this lockdown is the state’s “last”, with plans on how to remain open as vaccination rates increase.
NSW recorded 18 new COVID-19 cases in the 24 hours to 8pm on Monday, bringing the total number of people infected in the latest outbreak to 330.
Ms Berejiklian said the length of the lockdown would be informed by the fact the NSW government wanted this to be the state’s last.
The stay-at-home orders impact people in Greater Sydney, Wollongong, Shellharbour, the Central Coast and the Blue Mountains regions and had originally been due to end at midnight on Friday.
Exclusive school jabs
Meanwhile, it’s been revealed that 160 students from Sydney’s exclusive St Joseph’s College received their first dose of the Pfizer vaccine in May, despite it not being available for younger people or the general public.
The school issued a statement saying it approached Sydney Local Health District because the boys are boarders with some coming from rural communities, including remote Indigenous communities.
Sydney Local Health District chief executive Teresa Anderson on Tuesday said only Indigenous students — who are eligible — were supposed to be vaccinated.
“Through an error, the wider group of boarders in Year 12, a total of 163 students, were also vaccinated,” she said.
“Sydney Local Health District apologises for this error.”
Decision to ease Victoria restrictionsVictoria is aiming for its first full week of no COVID-19 community transmission since its fourth lockdown, as the state awaits a decision on eased restrictions.
An announcement on the state’s next step toward “COVID-normal” rules is expected on Wednesday.
Victorians have been living under the same set of restrictions for the past fortnight, including mandatory indoor masks and a 75 per cent office workplace cap.
Business groups have been lobbying for both measures to be scraped to encourage more Melbourne workers to return to the CBD.
Meanwhile authorities are threatening to shut the border to red zone returnees if they continue to go walkabout, as two international motorsport events were again cancelled.
Of 231 home compliance checks on Monday, three Victorians returning from interstate hotspots were found not isolating as required.
The state’s COVID-19 commander Jeroen Weimar said it was “hugely frustrating” and warned the state might have to suspend its red zone permit system.
The Victorian government announced the Australian Grand Prix in Melbourne and Australian MotoGP at Phillip Island would not go ahead later this year.
The 2021 Formula One event had already been pushed back from its regular early season timeslot to November in the hope restrictions on international arrivals would ease by then.
Mr Pakula is confident the 2022 Australian Open will be unimpeded as it vies to return to its traditional January timeslot.
Big business to administer jabs
The Federal Government and senior corporate figures are due to meet on Wednesday to discuss how businesses could be part of the vaccine rollout.
Employees could start receiving coronavirus vaccinations at work within months under the proposal as major companies put their hands up to administer jabs.
Businesses would use their existing workplace flu vaccination schemes already in place.
Treasurer Josh Frydenberg and John Frewen, who leads the vaccine task force, will discuss industry rollout options with business leaders.
Vaccine incentives are also on the agenda after firms including Qantas raised the prospect of rewarding vaccinated customers through loyalty schemes.
-with AAP
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