'Please come forward': Everyone in New South Wales with coronavirus symptoms is urged to get tested as the state conducts 8,000 checks per day
- Tests are now available to all residents with symptoms in New South Wales
- Previously residents had to be in certain hotspots or returned from overseas
- 'Please come forward and get tested,' Premier Gladys Berejiklian said
- Also said new contact tracing app is 'not that invasive' amid privacy concerns
- Here’s how to help people impacted by Covid-19
New South Wales Premier Gladys Berejiklian has urged all residents with coronavirus symptoms to get tested.
Until now testing was only available for residents if they had returned from overseas, had contact with an infected person or lived in a hotspot area.
But today Ms Berejiklian announced that anyone with symptoms such as a cough or a fever could get tested.
New South Wales Premier Gladys Berejiklian (pictured) has urged all residents with coronavirus symptoms to get tested
'If you have symptoms, if you are worried you have COVID-19, if you have been in contact with anyone and you are concerned you have the disease, please come forward and get tested,' she said.
She said she wants to get test numbers above 8,000 per day.
The capacity has been expanded after officials got their hands on more equipment needed to conduct tests, including certain chemicals.
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Ms Berejiklian also urged residents to download the federal government's contact tracing app when it is rolled out next week.
The app will record the Bluetooth connections a phone makes with others to identify someone's contacts if they catch the virus.
Huge privacy concerns have been raised, including the idea that police could use the app the work out where a suspect has been and who they have been near.
But Ms Berejiklian soothed these concerns, telling KIIS radio: 'The most specific thing you have to put in is your postcode. It's not that invasive to be honest.'
Cars queue up for a free drive-through COVID-19 test at Bondi Beach in Sydney on April 22
More than 7,300 tests were completed on Thursday with seven new cases of COVID-19 reported across the state. The total number of confirmed cases in NSW is 2982.
The state's COVID-19 death toll has reached 34 after a fourth resident at Anglicare's Newmarch House in Caddens died.
NSW Health confirmed the 79-year-old woman died early on Thursday morning.
Some 44 people at the western Sydney facility - 29 residents and 15 staff - have been infected with COVID-19.
NSW chief health officer Dr Kerry Chant said authorities have been working to limit the risk of COVID-19 entering aged care homes.
'It's impossible to have zero risk,' she told reporters on Friday.
Restricting visitor numbers, high levels of staff screening, and testing staff with minimal symptoms helps to minimise the chance of coronavirus entering aged care facilities, she said.
But, even with these measures in place, the virus can still impact aged care homes.
'Aged care will be a challenge going forward,' Dr Chant added.
Medical personnel carry equipment to the Bondi Beach drive-through testing centre, where people are queuing up in their vehicles to test for the coronavirus
