NSW premier Dominic Perrottet has ruled out reintroducing mask mandates or other restrictions, saying it is a matter of “personal responsibility”, despite the state setting another record for daily Covid infections.
NSW recorded 2,566 cases on Sunday, taking the tally for the past five days to more than 10,000.
Leading epidemiologists have called for masks to be reintroduced to indoor settings such as retail in NSW, and have expressed concern in recent days about mask mandates lifting as the Omicron variant appears to be partly driving a spike in cases.
Victoria was due to lift mask mandates for retail settings earlier in December, but has delayed doing so due to Omicron and rising case numbers.
On Sunday, Perrottet emphasised vaccination and booster shots as key to keeping hospital admissions down.
“I said the increasing cases will be come,” he said.
“What’s key to us is personal responsibility. Vaccination has been key, booster shots are crucial to keep people safe, and as we move through the next phase, case numbers will increase. That is the new normal.
“We’ll continue to monitor the situation. It’s a time for calm. But it’s also an important time to go out and get your booster shot. Because vaccination here has been key to New South Wales’s success. That’s not on the government, it’s on the people and our fantastic health teams.”
World Health Organization director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus last week warned governments against becoming complacent about Omicron, even if it turns out to be milder than Delta, saying its infectiousness alone is enough to overwhelm health systems. Other public health measures such as mask wearing, proper ventilation, hand hygiene and social distancing should not be dismissed yet, he said.
“Omicron is spreading at a rate we have not seen with any previous variant,” Ghebreyesus said. “Surely we have learned by now that we underestimate this virus at our peril.”
Perrottet was asked whether it was likely more restrictions would be imposed before Christmas. He responded that there are settings, such as hospitals, in which masks are still mandated, and said the government would continue to monitor case numbers and intensive care admissions. Some people were continuing to wear masks in other settings despite not being mandated to, he added, and said this was something the government “strongly” recommended.
“We’ll continue to take a balanced, proportionate and measured response,” he said.
“But this is all about taking personal responsibility. And the people of NSW are doing just that. The government can’t do everything. It’s over to the people of our state. It’s the people of our state that have got us through the last two years, and it’s the people of our state who will get us through the next two.”
Perrottet added that intensive care admissions were only in the 20s, and “that’s incredibly positive”.
On Saturday, the president of the Australian Medical Association (AMA), Dr Omar Khorshid, said it was “bizarre timing” for the NSW government to reduce mask restrictions while Covid cases rise and masks “are not a huge impact on personal freedoms”.
“Hospitalisations lag behind infections quite significantly by a week or even two weeks, it’s too late once we actually see a sharp rise in hospitalisations,” Khorshid said.
“And the right thing to do right now is try and flatten that curve a little bit, because we don’t know what proportion of people who get Omicron are going to end up in hospital. We simply don’t have that information as yet. It seems more mild, but if you end up with tens of thousands of people every day getting infected, which is quite a realistic prospect for NSW, then even if a small proportion end up in hospital, that could still overwhelm the system.”
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Asked about Khorshid’s comments, the NSW health minister Brad Hazzard said that while he had “heard” the AMA’s views, it was important to listen to a broader range of experts in the health system, including mental health experts and the experts helping “people staying in jobs”. He emphasised the importance of booster shots.
“I think there’s only one club that people should belong to here in NSW, and that’s the booster club,” Hazzard said. “So, what we’ve seen is a quadrupling of the number of boosters given out. That tells me people are voting with their feet to join the booster club and everyone in NSW who is eligible should get into that club. It certainly is one of the major protections that we can have against this worldwide pandemic.”