COVID NSW: No local cases, mass vaccination hub opens

NSW Health officials have issued a stern warning despite no new local coronavirus cases detected in the latest reporting period.

No new local COVID-19 cases were detected in NSW in the 24 hours to 8pm on Monday, with the source of infection in an Eastern Suburbs couple still a mystery.

Four new cases were detected in hotel quarantine in the latest reporting period.

State health officials administered 6,297 vaccines on Monday. There were 2,379 vaccines at the Homebush mass vaccination hub, about half of the 5,000 daily dose capacity.

NSW Health said “extensive investigations” had been unable to identify the source of the two local cases which sparked a return of some COVID-19 restrictions.

A man who first tested positive - before infecting his wife - “may have acquired the infection through brief contact with a currently unidentified person who was infectious in the community,” NSW Health said in a statement.

Earlier on Tuesday, NSW chief health officer Kerry Chant stressed the importance of using QR codes to check into businesses as COVID-19 contact tracers scramble to find the source of infection for a man from Sydney’s eastern suburbs.

Authorities continue to believe he caught the virus during brief contact with an infectious person who was likely running errands in the community.

NSW Chief Health Officer Kerry Chant. Picture: Mark Kolbe/Getty

“The team has been thinking of every which way this transmission could have occurred,” Dr Chant told 2GB on Tuesday.

“(So far it is a) case that’s popped up in the eastern suburbs without explanation.

“We’ve always got to keep an open mind that there could be another source.

“This always adds uncertainty but at the moment we don’t have any clear crossover point for this gentleman.”

NSW Health has listed nine venues as close contact, which requires people who visited during allocated times to self-isolate for 14 days regardless of their test result.

Dr Chant urged businesses and their customers to continue vigilantly signing in using the Service NSW app’s QR code.

“This is a wake up call … the QR codes, we really need those and people to be using them,” she said.

“I think people can get a bit complacent.”

SYDNEY MASS VACCINATION HUB OPENS

People aged between 40 and 49 could begin to get a Pfizer jab “within weeks,” Premier Gladys Berejiklian said after the NSW Government threw open the doors of its mass vaccination hub with the aim to use every available dose.

Despite not currently being eligible for a vaccine under the national rollout, around one million members of the general public aged 40-49 are now able to “register” interest in getting a Pfizer dose at the Homebush site.

Those in that age group who register will be contacted if the vaccination hub has jabs to spare.

The Covid19 Vaccination Centre at Sydney Olympic Park has opened. People are pictured in "Observation" after having their vaccinations. Picture: David Swift

Frontline workers such as police will be the first to get their vaccinations Picture: David Swift

“We’ve offered those expressions of interest so that we make sure that we don’t waste any doses,” chief health officer Kerry Chant said.

For those aged 40-49, Ms Berejiklian stressed the government “can’t tell you exactly when it will be your turn” but said “it could be within weeks”.

Federal Health Minister Greg Hunt backed the move yesterday, saying any “creative programs” to ensure vaccine doses aren’t wasted are a “great thing”.

Lines were stretching around the block at the mass vaccination site yesterday as frontline workers and their family members booked in for their jab.

Up to 5000 jabs a day can be administered at the hub, which has 300 workers. The hub doubles the maximum weekly dose capacity of NSW.

It was set up in just “20 working days,” NSW Health Deputy Secretary Susan Pearce said, after a senior Health official found the building on realcommercial.com.au.

Around 2500 people had booked in before Monday to get their vaccine shot on day one, with that number increasing throughout the day. The Premier said NSW has had thousands of people come forward and register for the next month.

Over 50s will be able to register for an AstraZeneca jab at the Homebush centre from May 24, but Ms Berejiklian said that cohort could get the vaccine through their GP from May 17.

NSW reported no new local cases on Monday, a day after a raft of restrictions were extended by a week.

Ms Berejiklian said the restrictions were based on “the best health advice from Dr Chant”.

People lined up around the block outside the centre to get their shots. Picture: David Swift

Getting a vaccination on Monday was Isabeau Williams, 28, whose partner is a cardiac surgeon that works with Covid-19 patients. Picture: David Swift

“I get the best advice from the chief medical officer, from the Health Minister, and we make sure we make the best decisions on behalf of the government,” she said.

Restrictions were extended when the source of two local cases remained a mystery. Dr Chant said the infection could have come from “fleeting” contact with an ­unknown infectious person and NSW Health is concerned about undetected “broader transmission”.

Paddington lawyer Isabeau Williams, 28, was eligible to get her jab because her partner is a cardiologist working with COVID patients at Royal Prince Alfred hospital.

She said she was “happy and grateful to be in Australia where we’ve dealt with (COVID-19) very well”.

Aditi Dand said it was an “overwhelming” experience to get a vaccine.

She said the jab is likely to be the “only way” she can go home to see her family in Mumbai.

EASIER TO ‘COME AND GO’ WITH VACCINE: HUNT

The ability to come and go from Australia more easily and not be subjected to as many restrictions is an “incentive” to get the COVID-19 vaccine, Health Minister Greg Hunt said.

Mr Hunt said the federal government was developing a road map for reopening Australia that would be a “progressive” easing of measures.

“It’s about progressive ­opening and that is very important for hope and understanding in Australia,” he said.

The road map will be based around “green lane” travel bubbles, increasing numbers of ­vaccinations and “progressive” opening of borders for people who have been fully vaccinated.

Health Minister Greg Hunt says those who are vaccinated will be able to move about more freely. Picture: Sam Mooy/Getty Images

Mr Hunt said the travel bubble with New Zealand was working well and he expected the capacity would eventually be ­expanded to the Pacific and “possibly Singapore or other countries”.

He said how much freedom Australians who get vaccinated will have will be determined by the “global medical evidence” about transmissibility of COVID-19 after vaccination.

“We know that there is near universal prevention of serious illness, hospitalisation and loss of life,” Mr Hunt said.

“We know there is a high prevention of infection and transmission but not universal.”