Vaccination levels pave way back to work

NSW is on track to hit six million vaccinations by the end of the month – enough to ease restrictions on work and schools by September.

A nurse administers a Covid-19 vaccine to a person in Lakemba. Picture: Getty Images

NSW is on track to hit six million vaccinations by the end of the month – enough to ease restrictions on work and schools by September, according to the road map out of lockdown touted by the ­Berejiklian government.

With 4.4 million jabs administered in NSW, the Premier insisted on Sunday that some restrictions could be eased at a threshold of 50 to 60 per cent of the population vaccinated – much lower than the 70 to 80 per cent target set by the Doherty Institute modelling for the federal government released last week.

But Gladys Berejiklian denied suggestions her targets were at odds with Scott Morrison’s, saying that the federal target applied to pre-lockdown level restrictions.

“We are currently in lockdown, and lockdown plus some level of easing of restrictions is possible once we get to 50 or 60 per cent rates of vaccination,” she said. “It doesn’t mean you get to what you would ease if you are at 70 per cent, but there are certainly opportunities for us to look at what we can ease in September; so long as we hit our vaccination targets, we can look for opportunities as to how we live in the month of September.”

About 40 per cent of people across NSW have received at least one jab, with the government ­organising special weekend mass vaccinations for groups of essential workers.

A “Super Sunday” vaccination was held at Sydney Olympic Park for supermarket workers, cafe and restaurant staff, with 5000 doses on AstraZeneca on offer. A similar event will be held for 8000 construction workers next Sunday.

The Premier discounted the prospect of mandatory vaccinations but again suggested incentives would be offered for people to get jabbed in exchange for greater freedoms such as the ability to work.

“I urge people now to come ­forward and get vaccinated, ­especially if you are in a job which traditionally has a lot to do with people, if it has face-to-face contact,” she said.

“We encourage you to get vaccinated as soon as possible, so that we have options moving forward into September about how we can move forward more freely.”

An indication of how that might play out came with the ­announcement that construction workers from the worst hit local government areas would be able to return to work sites provided the locations remained at half ­capacity – and that the workers were vaccinated. From Wednesday workers from those LGAs will have to be able to show proof of immunisation or of a negative Covid-19 test result. Rapid antigen testing is likely to be approved soon to speed up the process.

Harsh lockdown restrictions were extended into large parts of Penrith on Sunday, as the Covid-19 outbreak spread from its current Canterbury-Bankstown cluster.

With case numbers only marginally down – 262 new cases ­reported, with fewer than a third isolating while infectious – the government said it had no choice but to extend the lockdown to 12 suburbs close to the eight LGAs ­already subject to the harshest restrictions.

Residents in those 12 suburbs must stay in their local government area and can leave only for work if they are an essential worker.

Health authorities are concerned by the large numbers of new cases that were infectious while out in the community. At least 72 of the 262 new cases ­ were not in isolation during all or part of their infectious period, with the isolation status of a further 104 still under investigation.

There are now 362 cases in hospital, with 58 in intensive care and 24 cases needing ventilators to breathe.

An unvaccinated woman in her 80s from the Wyoming Nursing Home in Summer Hill, in Sydney’s inner west, died at Royal Prince Alfred Hospital on Saturday.