NSW Premier Dominic Perrottet has said residents must 'live alongside' Covid-19. Photo / Getty Images
NSW Premier Dominic Perrottet has said residents must 'live alongside' Covid-19. Photo / Getty Images
New South Wales Premier Dominic Perrottet has called for calm amid surging case numbers of Covid-19, saying ICU figures will be the key metric in determining whether tighter restrictions are required.
The state recorded 2501 new Covid-19 cases on Monday and hit its highest daily number of infections in the pandemic on Sunday with 2566 new cases.
There are now 261 people in NSW hospitals with the virus, including 33 in ICU. That compares with 1266 people requiring hospital treatment at the peak of the Delta outbreak.
Perrottet highlighted Monday's ICU figures as a "very important" indicator that vaccines were working against the Omicron Covid-19 variant.
"We have 33 people who are in ICU and 26 of those 33 are unvaccinated," he told reporters on Monday morning.
"The evidence is clear. The numbers do not lie. Getting vaccinated protects you and your family and that has been a key success for our state in being able to open up."
When questioned about growing calls to mandate masks and tighten Covid-19 restrictions, Perrottet said the state needed to adapt to living with the virus.
"We are taking a balanced and proportionate response that is completely focused on keeping people safe, while at the same time opening up our economy and ensuring that people are able to work and provide for their families," he said.
"There will always be new variants of this virus. The pandemic is not going away. We need to learn to live alongside it."
Restrictions were eased across NSW five days ago, with masks now only required on public transport, planes, at airports and for unvaccinated indoor front-of-house hospitality staff. QR code check-ins are now only required in certain "high risk" settings, including hospitals, gyms, places of worship, funeral services, pubs, nightclubs and large indoor music festivals.
NSW Premier Dominic Perrottet has said residents must 'live alongside' Covid-19. Photo / Getty Images
Monday's figures follow NSW Health Minister Brad Hazzard's refusal to publicly release recent Covid research suggesting the state could see a possible surge of up to 25,000 cases per day by the end of January.
Hazzard made the comment last week and was again quizzed about the modelling on Sunday.
"Modelling is only as good as the inputs that you have," he told reporters.
"I think it is considered to be excellent modelling but it is also modelling that has a lot of qualifications around it. It adds to our sense of heightened alertness but it isn't definitive, it is not locked in."
NSW Health Minister Brad Hazzard speaks during a Covid-19 update. Photo / Getty Images
Omicron warning
A Sydney-based clinical immunologist has shared a sobering view of how Christmas could turn into a superspreader event that could overwhelm NSW's hospital system.
In a 17-minute video posted to Facebook, Dr Dan Suan said NSW is "sleepwalking into an Omicron disaster" if no changes are made to curb infections in the six days leading up to Christmas.
"We risk turning Christmas Day into a simultaneous super spreader event all across Sydney in thousands of houses," he said. "And if everyone catches Omicron on Christmas Day, there will be a hospital-based disaster in early January."
Describing the situation as a "problem of pure maths," Suan said the increased transmissibility of Omicron and its resistance to vaccines means it has the potential to cause a massive outbreak.
"Omicron might be slightly less severe but if the outbreak is huge and you put those things together, we'll still have a huge number of people needing to be hospitalised," he said. "It will overwhelm the hospital system easy."
