The New South Wales chief health officer, Kerry Chant, has warned the state’s lockdown will not end unless residents follow strengthened public health orders, and that vaccination was “part of the solution” and a “not a silver bullet”.
Australia’s largest state woke up under a statewide lockdown on Sunday, while the federal government pledged half of the one million additional Pfizer doses it has secured from Poland will be directed into high-risk parts of Sydney.
The premier, Gladys Berejiklian, warned the 415 cases recorded on Sunday was a “welcome drop” from the record figure of 466 reported the previous day.
There were also four deaths reported on Sunday, including a woman in her 50s at Campbelltown hospital, another in her 70s at Royal North Shore hospital, a man in his 80s at Liverpool hospital and a woman in her 80s at Royal Prince Alfred hospital who was fully vaccinated.
Lockdowns were also in place in Victoria, where 25 new cases were reported on Sunday, and in the Australian Capital Territory, which recorded a further two cases.
In NSW, the government on Saturday night replaced region-specific restrictions – which began in greater Sydney but then fanned out across the state over seven weeks – with a statewide lockdown.
The premier has often insisted increased vaccine takeup would be key to easing restrictions and residents have responded in droves, meaning the state predicts it could hit a key vaccination threshold by late October.
On Sunday, Chant warned the vaccine rollout was not the only factor – and that it was also vital residents followed restrictions so the lockdown could be effective.
“There is no silver bullet and vaccination is not a silver bullet,” she said. “It is a tool. And vaccination alone will not get us out of this situation. We need to follow the public health orders, and my message to everyone is, let’s redouble our efforts for the next couple of weeks.”
Chant said about 500,000 extra doses provided by the federal government would be targeted at younger people in hotspot areas of Sydney, centred around the western suburbs.
“Those younger people are the ones who are going out and working on disability homes, aged care homes, childcare, logistics, freight,” she said.
The NSW government is hoping to have 70% of the eligible population vaccinated by late October, which is the national threshold that allows states to open up despite Covid cases in the community.
Berejiklian said NSW had now reached a first dose rate of 50%, while about a quarter of the state’s eligible population have had two doses.
Chant said she wanted to see both “declining case numbers and increasing vaccination uptake”, though she emphasised that people who had been vaccinated were not “immediately protected”.
“You need about two weeks, two to three weeks following vaccination to have any effect,” she said. “But vaccination is part of the solution.”
People who were vaccinated were less likely to get the virus or need hospital care if they do, Chant added.
Berejiklian said the government was looking at ways to ease the burden on vaccinated people throughout September and October.
“If you are vaccinated, they are opportunities we are exploring currently,” she said. “But of course that is also contingent on us making sure that this doesn’t take off.”
‘Yesterday was an absolute wake-up call’
Despite the state having been under lockdown for seven weeks with cases trending upward, Berejiklian also suggested the recent spike in cases was still a wake-up call.
“Yesterday was an absolute wake-up call,” she said. “We can’t stress enough that we don’t want to go down the path of all these other places overseas where they have literally thousands and thousands and thousands of cases a day.
“That is what Delta is doing to communities that have much higher vaccination rate than we do.”
Still, Berejiklian added that “all of us accept that completely eliminating Delta is something that is near impossible”.
Authorities in NSW have said in recent weeks they have been battling workplace transmission and, more recently, household spread fuelled by residents continuing to meet in homes against the rules.
A bolstered police operation was slated to begin at midnight, while Chant issued a desperate plea for people to follow the rules. “We need the community to stay with us,” she said.
“What I’m saying is it is a very, very bad picture if we don’t make that choice together. And everyone has a role to play,” Chant added.
Berejiklian noted there had been a “massive stabilisation” in western Sydney, the epicentre of the outbreak in the city.
However, Chant said authorities were still concerned about the situation in the Maitland area, about 160km north of Sydney, and also in parts of western NSW, where there are large Aboriginal communities.
On Sunday the federal health minister, Greg Hunt, announced that rapid antigen tests would be rolled out to some Sydney aged care homes “to further protect aged care residents, workers and their families”, with hopes of expanding the rapid Covid testing to more facilities.
A test and isolate payment of $320 will also start next week for workers aged 17 and over who have symptoms of Covid-19 and live in government areas of concern.
But the state opposition wants the payment to be available statewide, as it is in Victoria.
“The test and isolate payment must be in every part of NSW,” said the NSW Labor leader Chris Minns.
In Victoria, Melbourne is battling a stubborn outbreak that continues to involve a number of “mystery cases” that cannot be linked. Of the 25 infections recorded on Sunday, four could not yet be connected to an existing case.
“Those numbers continue to grow, and that is very challenging,” said the state premier, Daniel Andrews.
The current lockdown of greater Melbourne, now in its second week, is slated to end on Thursday, though an easing of these restrictions now appears unlikely.
“If we were to reopen the whole economy, if we were to reopen and let people move freely right now, then we would finish up where Sydney is,” Andrews said.
The latest outbreak in Melbourne had centred around the western suburbs, but has since spread all across the city.
Andrews was critical of Melburnians who held a “pub crawl” on the streets of a popular night strip in the inner city suburb of Richmond on Saturday night.
“They are the sorts of decisions that make the job of our contact tracers much harder and it’s just an insult to everybody out there who is doing the right thing,” he said.
In the ACT, authorities continue to manage an outbreak that has placed Canberra under a seven-day lockdown. The two cases recorded on Sunday takes the current outbreak to nine.
Canberrans, who have not experienced a lockdown in 12 months, have turned out to be tested in record numbers, causing some delays.
The chief minister, Andrew Barr, praised the city’s residents on Sunday.
“The response from the Canberra community has been fantastic,” he said.