Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk declares new Covid-19 wave for Queensland

Queensland is in the grip of a fourth Covid-19 wave with authorities confirming a jump in hospitalisations and ambulance call-outs and the presence of a number of Omicron sub-variants that are likely to ‘escape immunity’.

Queensland is in the grip of a fourth Covid-19 wave, with authorities confirming a jump in hospitalisations and ambulance call-outs and the presence of a number of Omicron sub-variants that are likely to “escape immunity”.

The state’s Covid-19 traffic light system will switch from green to amber from Friday amid a spike in hospital admissions, but Chief Health Officer John Gerrard said on Thursday case numbers would have to be significantly higher for the state to move to red.

He said while the new subvariants of the virus were harder to model, he predicted the wave would peak before Christmas.

Dr Gerrard said there had been a 58 per cent increase in active cases and a 93 per cent spike in hospitalisations.

Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk flagged growing concern about case numbers in Parliament on Thursday morning.

“No one should be alarmed. We have been living with this virus for a long time and Queenslanders know what to do,” she said.

“The Chief Health Officer has advised that our Covid traffic light system should switch from green to amber.”

Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk in Parliament on Thursday. Picture: Dan Peled/NCA NewsWire

Health Minister Yvette D’Ath confirmed a number of subvariants in the new wave.

She said while the bulk of the cases were being detected in Metro North public hospitals, cases would soon spread further.

“We expect that we will see broad transmission again of these subvariants,” she said.

Ms D’Ath said it was not currently required to wear a mask, but the state was making recommendations for those in vulnerable situations.

Dr Gerrard said the fourth wave was not unexpected.

📣 New COVID-19 traffic light system 🚥
Living with COVID-19 means recognising and responding when the risk increases and decreases.
Here's the latest on the new system. 👇 pic.twitter.com/6zuiRDU5lR

— Queensland Health (@qldhealth) October 31, 2022

“Most of the increase in activity has been seen over the past week, particularly since the weekend,” he said.

He said there was a “soup of variants” in the community.

“We’re seeing growth of XBB and BQ.1,” he said.

“BQ.1 does seem to be growing quickly in Queensland at the moment; whether it becomes the dominant strain we don’t know yet.”

He said the peak of the wave was likely to occur prior to Christmas, and people aged over 70 and the immunocompromised should look into accessing antiviral medication.

“The shape of this particular wave is difficult to predict,” he said.

“If it takes the same shape of previous waves, the peak has occurred five to six weeks from the onset.”

Dr Gerrard said based on observations from Singapore and Europe it would be a shorter and sharper wave, which would put the peak at the beginning of December.

The two strains were more likely to escape immunity, Dr Gerrard said, which is why they were becoming dominant.

Treatments for immunocompromised were also less effective against these strains, which Dr Gerrard said was concerning.

He said those with some degree of immunity could avoid severe illness from the new subvariants.

“In 2022, Covid-19 looks nothing like Covid-19 in 2021 without immunisation,” he said.

Some degree of waning immunity and the new sub variants could have sparked the newest wave, Dr Gerrard said.

Queensland Chief Health Officer Dr John Gerrard

“We expect this virus will vanish into the background of other viruses. But that could take months, it could even take years, no one knows,” he said.

Dr Gerrard said there were too many variables now to be able to rely on modelling.

“If it follows the pattern we’re seeing in the Northern Hemisphere it will be shorter and sharper, but there’s no guarantee of that,” he said.

Dr Gerrard said he’d been in hospitals for the last week where cases were emerging.

“It spread very quickly across the state,” he said.

Dr Gerrard said now was the perfect time to get boosted to have peak immunity against the virus.

Cases would need to be significantly higher for the state to move into the red section on the traffic light system.

“That would be where hospitals are coming under significant strain,” he said.

He said he could not see a circumstance where there would be a lockdown between now and Christmas.

The change in the traffic light system does not mean there will be any new restrictions.

However the government is recommending that Queenslanders wear a mask in indoor settings, on public transport and in hospitals.

“This applies especially to older members of the community and those at risk,” Ms Palaszczuk said on Thursday morning.

“As always, stay home if you are sick and get a RAT test.”

Ms Palaszczuk’s declaration comes as a new Covid-19 strain rapidly spreads across Australia.

The XBB strain, which is resistant to vaccines and antibodies from previous infections, emerged in Singapore a few weeks ago.

Within a week, it went from making up one fifth of the country’s Covid-19 cases to more than a half.

The government unveiled the traffic light system last month ahead of the expiration of Dr Gerrard’s pandemic powers.

Green is when the state is at its lowest level of risk, amber is implemented when case numbers escalate, while the red tier is when the state is on the highest level of alert.

Earlier this week, infectious diseases expert Paul Griffin told The Courier-Mail there was a danger people were becoming complacent about keeping up with vaccination.

Queensland currently has the lowest rate of vaccination in the country, with just over 65 per cent of eligible residents having received a booster shot as of November 2.

“Having the lowest rates in the country does leave us susceptible to greater impacts than we should necessarily see when we have that virus in our population, just like we do at the moment,” Dr Griffin said.

Hundreds of people are still dying with Covid-19, with the state recently returning to weekly reporting of case numbers.

The latest Queensland Health data on Queensland’s Covid-19 numbers reveals that 14 people died with the virus between October 27 to November 2.

In the same time, there were 4427 new cases reported, with 105 people in hospital, three in intensive care.