NSW records 15 deaths from Covid-19 – including FIVE who were fully-vaccinated – as state records 864 new cases and charges towards Freedom Day with 64% double-jabbed
- NSW has now hit 64 per cent of residents with both doses of the Covid vaccine
- Fifteen deaths were recorded on Friday including five who’d received both jabs
- Majority of the new Covid-19 cases remain in Sydney’s west and south-west
New South Wales has recorded another 864 cases Covid-19 cases and 15 deaths including five residents who were fully vaccinated.
The deaths announced on Friday – which is the state’s equal deadliest day of the pandemic – include three people aged in their 50s while nine were unvaccinated and one had received one dose.
The grim numbers come as 64 per cent of residents in the state have now had both jabs, with Freedom Day just around the corner.
Sydney is expected to open up on October 11, the Monday after 70 per cent of the population have been fully vaccinated, marking an end to a gruelling four-month lockdown.
New South Wales has recorded another 864 cases Covid-19 cases and 15 deaths including five residents who were fully vaccinated
More than 300 of Friday’s cases are from Sydney’s west and south-west with the Illawarra Shoalhaven region also suffering a surge in infections with 96 new cases.
The latest Covid victims also include two people in their 60s, two in their 70s, six people in their 80s, and two in their 90s – bringing the total number of deaths in the recent outbreak to 352.
Around the state there are 1,055 Covid patients in hospital with 210 in intensive care.
The latest figures come after it was announced fully vaccinated NSW residents identified as close contacts of Covid cases will no longer need to self-isolate – even if they’ve hugged or kissed an infected person.
Updates to public health guidelines on September 28 show how clusters could be handled when NSW lifts restrictions as vaccine targets of 70 and 80 per cent are met.
The amendments – which have not been finalised – reveal new ‘risk assessment’ protocols for retail, offices, pubs, cafes, universities, building sites and warehouses.
Those who have had two doses of a Covid vaccine are set to be considered ‘low risk’ or ‘casual contacts’ even if they have direct contact with a confirmed Covid case.
Under current rules if a person is ‘pinged’ by NSW Health as having been a close contact of an infected person or been present at a close contact exposure site, they are required to self-quarantine for 14 days regardless of a test result.
Fully-vaccinated residents in NSW would no longer be required to isolate if they are deems to close contact of a Covid case under planned changes to public health orders
But under the new rules this would be waived for double-jabbed individuals at both outdoor and indoor venues even if they have physical contact with a confirmed case such as ‘shaking hands, hugging or kissing’.
On Wednesday, NSW premier Gladys Berejiklian said the state’s measures for contact tracing when we hit vaccination milestones were now being worked out by health officials who would then provide the advice to government.
‘When 70 or 80 per cent of your adult population is fully vaccinated, it does mean you deal with contact tracing differently,’ Ms Berejiklian said.
‘You don’t have to be as cautious with close contacts, you don’t have to be as cautious with a whole range of things you deal with.
‘That applies to schools as well.
‘I want to make it clear that contact tracing, and the way we deal with positive cases for fully vaccinated people, will look a bit differently to what it does today.’
More to come.