Sydney : Australia’s New South Wales again posted a record number of new Covid-19 cases and four deaths despite being ten weeks into lockdown, said dpa international.
The state recorded 1,533 new locally acquired Covid-19 cases in the 24 hours to 8:00 pm Friday evening, according to NSW Health.
That is the highest number ever recorded in a day in an Australian jurisdiction, national broadcaster ABC News reported.
While offering condolences to the families of the victims, Health Minister Brad Hazzard stressed that vaccination rates were the “good news”.
“NSW residents are still getting out there and getting vaccinated at a great rate of speed,” Australian Associated Press quoted Hazzard as saying.
“There were almost 130,000 vaccines yesterday administered in NSW,” he said.
The total number of jabs in the state has gone up to over 7.2 million, with over 36 per cent of over-16s fully vaccinated.
New South Wales had topped 1,000 daily coronavirus cases for the first time since the pandemic began just over a week ago.
The number of Covid-19-related deaths in the state is now up to 123 since 16 June, when the first infection in this outbreak was reported.
Australia, with its 25 million inhabitants, was very successful in the fight against the pandemic for a long time because of extremely strict measures, including by keeping its international border closed with few exceptions since March 2020.
However, a large proportion of the population is back in lockdown due to the spread of the Delta variant and an initially slow roll-out of vaccinations.
Over 56,500 cases have been confirmed nationwide and over 1,000 people have died in connection with Covid-19.
