Sydney COVID-19 restrictions: Northern beaches lockdown after spike

From tonight there will be only four reasons that northern beaches residents can leave their home in the strictest rules since March.

From 5pm tonight residents of Sydney’s northern beaches will only be able to leave their homes for four essential reasons in an urgent bid to prevent the region’s coronavirus outbreak from spreading.

Premier Gladys Berejiklian has also put the rest of Sydney “on notice” that restrictions could follow in other parts of the city.

NSW Health has recorded another 23 cases of COVID-19 in the past 24 hours, with 21 of those linked to the Avalon cluster while two remain under investigation.

Ms Berejiklian announced the stay at home order this morning, saying the local government area was essentially “going back to the restrictions that were in place back in March”.

Residents will only be allowed to leave the house for work, exercise, essential shopping and medical treatment.

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NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian made the announcement this morning. Picture: Janie Barrett – Pool/Getty Images.

“It is OK to go out and exercise, it is OK to go essential shopping, do not panic buy

please,” Ms Berejiklian said.

“You can go shopping any time, it is OK to go out for work, or compassionate grounds including emergency medical treatment or to visit an isolated relative, etc.”

The order will come into effect tonight and stay in place until midnight on Wednesday, when health officials hope they can get the outbreak under control.

“We are hoping that will give us sufficient time to get on top of the virus so we can then ease up for Christmas and the New Year moving forward,” she said.

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People pictured waiting in line at the pop-up COVID-19 clinic at Newport Community Centre last night. Picture: Monique Harmer.

The government was also considering restrictions for the rest of Sydney as a “possibility”.

“Now, I should say, to put everybody on notice, we will be considering today after consulting obviously the relevant people, whether this time tomorrow we do revert back to some restrictions in greater Sydney, but we are still considering that,” Ms Berejiklian said.

“I just want to put everybody on notice that that is a possibility and that will depend on the help advice sent to us during the course of the day.”

Ms Berejiklian also asked that all Sydney resident reconsider non-essential activity and monitor for symptoms.

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The premier urged northern beaches residents not to panic buy. Picture: Jenny Evans/Getty Images.

“We are asking you to do this in good faith. We are asking you not to undertake non-essential travel, or non-essential activity,” she said.

“If you are planning a night out tonight, we ask you to consider changing those plans on staying at home.

“We want people to stay at home tonight and the next few nights so that we can ensure the virus does not spread, if there are any fragments of the virus outside of the northern beaches, and we also want to make sure that we give all of Sydney the best chance we have to having a good Christmas.”

NSW’s chief health officer Dr Kerry Chant also asked that people outside of the northern beaches “limit” their travel to the area.

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Avalon Beach RSL. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Jeremy Piper

“We asked the northern beaches residents to obviously only leave home for those essential reasons outlined by the Premier,” she said.

“We also request that people not only limit their entrance to the northern beaches to essential reasons as well.”

Ahead of tonight’s lockdown NSW Health Minister Brad Hazzard called on all northern beaches residents to shelve any social gatherings they had planned for today.

“Can I emphasise one thing, to my local northern beaches and that is this,” he said.

“The lawyers are working with us now to put in place the orders for 5pm, but as a local I send this message very clearly to all locals, and that is you should actually be not going anywhere in any substantial groups today, right from now, in fact the last couple of days.

“So if you have got lunches with a lot of friends today, cancel it. If you are going out for big functions this afternoon, cancel it.

“If you are going to a gym, hopefully the gyms have closed, they will be closed by 5pm but I would not be going to a gym.”