The lockdown for regional and rural NSW will be extended to August 28th to align with the current greater Sydney lockdown the NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian announced this morning.
All through the NSW Premier's morning speech and question time the narrative was repetitive that the best way forward out of lockdown was increasing vaccination rates, people with symptoms to come forward and be tested and that everyone be diligent and limit their movements unless absolutely necessary. Over 106,000 vaccines were administered in the past 24 hours and 28% of NSW is fully vaccinated.
The Deputy Premier John Barilaro has also advised that NSW Health has informed him of two positive COVID-19 cases in Queanbeyan.
“It is understood the two people work in the ACT but live in Queanbeyan. Contact tracing is underway and there are no public exposure sites in our region at this stage,” said Mr Barilaro.
Mr Barilaro also commented there are a number of testing clinics operating in Queanbeyan and across the Monaro should anyone need to be tested.
When asked about the relationship the mountains have with the ACT and their current cases and lockdown, and how that would affect the Snowy Monaro and the snow resorts re-opening to complete the remainder of their snow season, Mr Barilaro said he was confident that when the current lockdown expires the Snowy Monaro region will come out of lockdown.
“Well Canberra remains a risk, does remain a risk to the Snowy Monaro but at this stage in the sewage protection there have been no cases and to be honest, you think about the snowies, they've had a lot of people come into the region to ski, and we've been able to get to this point in the season without any issue.”
“That will all come into account but I'm confident that the Snowy Monaro will come out if everything remains the same as today, but as we've had a breach from Canberra into Queanbeyan we know there is a transient community that work from Michelago, from Cooma into Canberra for instance, from Bredbo and further up, so there is a risk there but it's too early to call at this stage. On what we've seen so far on the surveillance there is no reason the Snowy Monaro wouldn't come out of a lockdown along with the rest of regional New South Wales.”
After the extended lockdown announcement Perisher posted on their social media sites.
“We’ve missed seeing you on our slopes this week and with news of the state-wide lockdown extension we will remain closed for this period. Please do your bit by following the health orders to help get us back on the slopes as soon as possible,” said Perisher Facebook.
Mr Barilaro said he wants to increase messaging on vaccination rates here in the Snowy Monaro region and what is available for businesses with support during the lockdown period.
“We want to ramp up vaccination, want to ramp up testing, we need to make sure people are aware of business grants which I think there's still some misinformation in the regions who's applicable and who isn't. They think it's a business grant or the business support is for Sydney, it's statewide."
The NSW Government are also working to have all local government areas being able to access live data on their area with vaccination rates. They will then be looking to target areas that are falling behind the rest of the state. He mentioned the Central Coast area where first doses were 55% and second doses were 27.5% which puts it on the state average.
Anyone with even the mildest of symptoms, please get tested. For testing clinic locations and operating hours visit: www.snswlhd.health.nsw.gov.au
For people looking to see support or grants are available for their situation, visit the Service NSW website at https://www.service.nsw.gov.au/campaign/covid-19-help-businesses for more information.
