NSW ramps up jabs, virus hits health staff
Three healthcare workers are among the latest COVID-19 cases in NSW as the state's premier announced plans to ramp up vaccinations.
Twenty-four new local cases were recorded in the 24 hours to 8pm on Wednesday, including a student nurse who worked at Fairfield and Royal North Shore hospitals in Sydney.
Two of the nurse's contacts were also deemed COVID-positive after the 8pm deadline and will be included in Friday's numbers - a healthcare worker at the RNS, Fairfield and Royal Ryde Rehabilitation hospitals and an aged care worker at SummitCare in Baulkham Hills.
Their diagnoses have sparked fears of an outbreak within the healthcare system, with hundreds of people sent into isolation and at least two hospital wards and a nursing home in lockdown.
The 24-year-old student nurse worked up to five days while infectious, but the other healthcare workers are not believed to have worked during the infectious period.
Almost all of the 149 residents at the Baulkham Hills facility are fully vaccinated against COVID-19 and the home is now in lockdown after being deep-cleaned.
Of the 24 cases reported on Thursday, which took the outbreak to 195 cases, only half were in isolation for the entirety of their infectious period, again spiking the number of potential exposure sites.
As the halfway mark of lockdown approaches, Premier Gladys Berejiklian renewed her plea for people to stay home as much as possible.
"People going about their business, shopping and interacting with others is causing the virus to continue to circulate," she told reporters.
"If we want the lockdown to succeed, all of us to have minimise our movements, minimise our interaction with others."
Ms Berejiklian also announced mass COVID-19 vaccination hubs would be established at Macquarie Fields in Sydney's southwest, Wollongong and the Sydney CBD.
It's hoped the hubs will boost the number of jabs administered in NSW to 200,000 a week and enable authorities to dramatically ramp up vaccinations once the government's supply of Pfizer vaccine increases.
Additionally, 22 pharmacies will administer the AstraZeneca jab in remote NSW under a pilot program to begin in two weeks' time.
