Khorshid said the country’s political leaders need to make stronger public health recommendations.
“I’ve publicly called on the premiers to make sure that if they get a strong recommendation from their experts to reintroduce mandates in certain settings then they should follow that,because that has been what has protected us so far through this pandemic.”
Albanese declined to share COVID-19 forecasts but said cases were expected to peak next month.
Australia has recorded a rolling seven-day average of more than 41,000 new cases a day,and data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics showed record and near-record numbers of people worked fewer hours in June and May due to illness.
Pandemic leave payments have cost the federal government $1.9 billion over the past two years. Albanese said the payments,which will be split by state and federal governments,are expected to cost about $780 million in the next two-and-a-half months.
“We’ll encourage people to follow the health advice to take precautions. This is a very infectious disease. The Chief[Medical] Officer likened it to the infection rate of measles rather than the previous variants of COVID,and that is something which is a sobering thought for people,” Albanese said.
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Hospitalisation rates continue to rise. Victoria hasrecorded more than 800 hospitalisations,the highest number since the start of February,and Queensland has recorded more than 900 hospitalisations for the first time in the pandemic. More than 2000 people are hospitalised with COVID in NSW.
A NSW Health spokesperson said the impact of school holidays on the potential peak of the wave was uncertain,with “adjustments” being made to non-urgent elective surgery at a hospital and local health district level.
Chief Health Officer Kerry Chant has previously said the latest wave was expected to peak in late July or early August with hospitalisations similar to those in January,which reached more than 2900 at the highest point.
“Current adjustments to non-urgent elective surgery are made on the specific circumstances of hospitals or LHDs to ensure the capacity and resources required for the COVID-19 response are maintained and patients continued to receive safe care,” the spokesperson said. There are more than 2500 health staff on sick leave or isolating in NSW.
In secret modelling for the Victorian government,the Burnet Institute has projected cases of the new variants could overtake the summer surge of hospitalisations – when 1200 beds were filled with COVID-19 patients.
This week,NSW Education Minister Sarah Mitchell said if case numbers in particular schools increased or if there were large outbreaks then restrictions in local school communities could be reinstated for short periods.
“That can include things like mask wearing,or not having assemblies or big gatherings. And we’re doing that based on where we see the numbers[heading] and where we see the impacts in our school communities.”
She said there had been a 30 per cent increase in sick days taken by teachers and staff this year,which was directly related to COVID-19 and flu,and it is putting pressure on our school systems.
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Aged and Community Care Providers Association interim head Paul Sadler said governments also need to do more to support aged care providers following “alarming rise” in COVID outbreaks at aged care facilities,with nearly a third of the country’s facilities currently experiencing outbreaks.
“Already,more than 5200 residents and 2700 staff are infected. Over 2100 residents have died this year. We want to help providers to avoid at all costs a repeat of the first Omicron wave at the beginning of the year,” he said.
Acting Opposition Leader Sussan Ley said Albanese had been “dragged kicking and screaming” to reverse his stance on continuing the pandemic leave payments.
“He knew as those payments were concluding exactly[when] the health situation was turning into with new waves of COVID,” she told the ABC on Saturday afternoon.
The prime minister denied he had done an about-face on the payments. “We’ve received advice based upon this surge that is occurring.”
The government also reinstated the crisis payment for people on income support or in severe financial hardship,and has introduced a new telehealth subsidy to allow doctors longer appointments for prescribing COVID-19 treatments.
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State and territory leaders said they were increasing access to rapid antigen tests,after the federal program providing free tests to concession-card holders ended.