Queensland records 3118 Covid cases after warning to prepare for tens of thousands daily infections

Queensland has recorded 3118 new cases of Covid-19 after a grim warning from the state’s top doctor that infections will soon surge.

Queensland has recorded 3118 new cases of Covid-19 overnight after the state was warned to expect tens of thousands of infections as the Omicron outbreak continues to tear across the country.

It brings Queensland’s total number of cases to 13,863 including 11,697 active cases.

A man, aged in his 50s, is in a stable condition in intensive care but he is not on a ventilator.

“Interestingly, he has the Delta variant of the virus rather than the Omicron variant,” chief health officer John Gerrard told reporters on Friday.

“He is vaccinated. He has received two doses of the vaccine a few months ago, so this reminds us that even if you are vaccinated it is possible to get quite sick with Covid-19.

“It does happen — we’ve known this all along.”

Covid testing line at 4 Cyte testing centre at Goodna, Queensland, closed early on December 30. Picture: David Clark

There were more than 35,000 tests conducted on Thursday and Dr Gerrard said queues were generally improving although demand remained high.

“We believe the changes made at national cabinet should decrease the numbers waiting in queues for PCR tests in the coming weeks,” he said.

“We are currently looking after 2227 people in their place of residence and there are 126 people in hospital ... (but) just because they have Covid doesn’t mean that that is the cause of their admission to the hospital.

“The much better indicator of the severity of the disease is the number of people that are in the intensive care unit.”

Chief health officer John Gerrard has predicted Queensland will soon hit 10,000 Covid cases per day. Picture: Zak Simmonds

Earlier, Dr Gerrard said he agreed with the national cabinet decision to change the definition of a close contact, but said people should prepare for a major spike in cases.

“I’m talking to my colleagues in hospitals regularly and I can say it is likely in the coming days that there will be intensive care admissions … there definitely are sick patients in hospital,” he said.

“We’re not going to be talking about 8000 cases in a few weeks, we’re going to be talking about tens of thousands of cases and that’s what a pandemic is about – very large numbers of cases.”

However, Dr Gerrard also said the surge was happening at a relatively optimal time due to warm summer weather and more than 86 per cent of the state being fully vaccinated.

“This is the time to be having a pandemic,” he said.

“If we are to experience this pandemic, in January is probably the best time because it’s warm and we know that the virus spreads more easily in the cooler months.”