Covid Qld: CHO’s warning as Covid cases fall to 7k and three deaths

The chief health officer has warned against complacency as the Premier revealed “heartening” new Covid-19 case numbers that have fallen again, as the state recorded 7462 new Covid-19 cases and three more deaths in the past 24 hours.

Queensland has recorded 7462 new Covid cases and three deaths, in “heartening” news, while the chief health officer has warned against complacency as the numbers continue to fall.

Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk gave her condolences to those families but said it was positive that the initial numbers were coming down.

“It’s very promising so fingers crossed it continues as case numbers are beginning to drop,” Ms Palaszczuk said.

Of the three deaths, one person was in their 60s, one in their 80s and one in their 90s.

Chief Health Officer Dr John Gerrard warned it was too early to consider that the reduced number of deaths was a trend.

There are 744 people being treated in hospital, with 46 in intensive care.

He said the numbers of hospitalisations on the Gold Coast, Logan, Ipswich and Cairns had come down.

Dr Gerrard said there has been a 15 per cent decrease in hospitalisations across Queensland, with the most significant drop in occupied beds in regions such as the Gold Coast, Logan, and Cairns.

Dr Gerrard said he expects hospitalisations across Queensland to continue their downward trend in the coming weeks.

Hospitalisations in Queensland have dropped from 878 to 744 in recent weeks.

Of Queensland’s eligible population, 91.98 have received their first dose, and 89.53 are double-dosed.

The Premier said it was great that Queensland is so close to that 90 per cent target of people being double dosed.

Some 1.4 million Queenslanders have received their booster.

Health Minister Yvette D’Ath said that the daily number of 5-11 year-olds was beginning to drop and it was important that adults continued to get their children vaccinated.

Queensland Chief Health Officer Dr John Gerrard. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Dan Peled

She said only about 67 per cent of 12- to 15-year-olds were double dosed and authorities hoped that number would be higher.

She also appealed to indigenous Queenslanders to check whether they were up for their booster shot now by checking the date of their second dose.

People are able to get their booster dose three months after their second dose.

Ms D’Ath said children were not likely to get seriously unwell, but they were likely to transmit it.

Vaccinations would reduce that transmission, she said.

Ms D’Ath said “we are not through the wave” and so elective surgery would remain paused until the start of March.

She said Queensland Health’s public health unit would weigh up school outbreaks and how to respond.

“It’ll depend on whether that child was unwell at school and the public health unit will still do the normal contact tracing to define who needs to go into quarantine as a close contact,” she said.

“So it won’t be an absolute.

“It’s not that every school would close down or whole classrooms need to quarantine.”

She said parents should take their children to a testing facility if they wake up feeling unwell before a school day.

She said authorities did not want sick teachers or children coming to school to access rapid antigen tests there.

It comes as the business community welcomes calls for Queenslanders to return to the office from February 7 as “a ­positive step on the road to recovery”.

The return to work call coincides with the delayed beginning of the new school term, with a range of new mandates unveiled on Sunday, including who needs to wear masks, when Rapid Antigen Tests would be needed and what people should do if they experience symptoms.

The education industry said the decision not to test kids unless they were experiencing symptoms was a commonsense approach.