Australia reported its first confirmed loss of life from the brand new Omicron variant of Covid-19 on Monday amid one other surge in every day infections, however the authorities avoided imposing new restrictions saying hospitalisation charges remained low.
The loss of life of the affected person in his 80s with underlying well being circumstances, marked a grim milestone for the nation which has needed to reverse some elements of a staged reopening after practically two years of stop-start lockdowns, because of the contemporary outbreak.
Omicron, which well being specialists say seems extra contagious however much less virulent than earlier strains, started to unfold within the nation simply because it lifted restrictions on most home borders and allowed Australians to return from abroad with out quarantine, driving case numbers to the best of the pandemic.
The authorities gave no further particulars in regards to the Omicron loss of life, besides to say that the person caught the virus at an aged care facility and died in a Sydney hospital.
“This was the first known death in New South Wales (state) linked to the Omicron variant of concern,” mentioned NSW Health epidemiologist Christine Selvey in a video launched by the federal government.
The affected person was amongst six Covid -19 deaths reported in Australia yesterday, all in probably the most populous states of NSW and Victoria, that are residence to greater than half the nation’s 25 million inhabitants.
Australia clocked simply over 9,400 new instances on Monday, barely down from yesterday’s document however not together with instances from the state of South Australia, which was but to report its numbers. Most new instances have been in NSW and Victoria.
“Although we are seeing increased case numbers, we are not seeing the impacts on our hospital system,” mentioned Annastacia Palaszczuk, premier of Queensland, which reported 784 new instances with 4 folks in hospital.
With stories of six-hour wait occasions for Covid testing for folks hoping to fulfill necessities for interstate vacation journey, Palaszczuk defended the tourism-friendly state for obligatory testing, saying “everyone knew when they booked a ticket that if they wanted to come here they would have to do a PCR test”.
However, she added that Queensland was contemplating whether or not to chill out the testing necessities for home guests. Tasmania, one other tourist-popular state, additionally mentioned it was contemplating modifications to state border testing guidelines.
Around the nation, the surge in infections in the meantime weighed on testing assets. Sydney testing clinic SydPath had confirmed a day earlier that it wrongly advised 400 Covid-positive folks they have been unfavourable within the days earlier than Christmas; on Monday it now realised that it had despatched fallacious consequence messages to a different 995 folks.
Australian authorities have to this point resisted a return to lockdown within the face of surging case numbers, however have reinstated some restrictions.
On Monday, NSW once more made it obligatory to test into public venues with QR codes, whereas many states have introduced again obligatory mask-wearing in indoor public locations.
The nation has additionally narrowed the window for vaccine booster photographs from six months to 4 months, quickly to be three months.
