New South Wales has recorded 49 new Covid-19 deaths but the number of people being treated in the state's hospitals and intensive care units has continued to plateau.
Photo: AFP
A total of 2693 people with the virus are in the state's hospitals, of which 186 are in ICU.
There were 13,354 new cases recorded in the reporting period, of which 5426 were from positive rapid antigen tests and 7928 were from PCR swabs.
NSW Health said 37.5 percent of the population had received their booster shot.
The state yesterday recorded 70 fatalities, although 35 of those were historical deaths which occurred at aged care facilities.
There was a delay in reporting the deaths to NSW Health.
Today's daily death toll is the state's second highest since the start of the pandemic, after yesterday's total.
The number of people being treated for Covid in hospital and in intensive care dropped slightly from the previous reporting period.
Premier Dominic Perrottet yesterday said the state was "tracking within capacity".
Hospital admissions have plateaued over the past week, as predicted, and modelling released yesterday by the NSW government showed the number of seriously ill people in ICU had been below "best case" scenarios.
Although hospital rates have been bouncing around slightly, NSW Health deputy secretary Susan Pearce said a decline was expected next week.
"They might not follow a lovely curve, and it may be a bit lumpy but we do expect that in the coming week we will start to see some declines," she said.
NSW Health Minister Brad Hazzard told the ABC yesterday he would like to see the third jab, currently being given as a booster, essential for people to be considered fully vaccinated across Australia.
He said this policy change would have to be made by national Cabinet and was not sure why there had not been any progress on the issue yet.
"I'm not part of national Cabinet, but I understand that most of these things require a range of medical expert input," he said.
Victoria reports 31 deaths
Victoria has reported 31 more Covid-19 deaths, as hospitalisations continue to fall.
There are 953 Covid-19 patients in Victorian hospitals, down from 988 on Friday.
Of those in hospital, 114 patients are in intensive care and 39 are on ventilators.
The state has reported 12,250 new Covid-19 infections that came from 6244 PCR tests and 6006 rapid antigen tests.
It takes the official number of active cases in the state to 79,836, well down from figures of more than 200,000 in mid-January.
Around 37 percent of Victorians adults have now received at least three doses of a Covid-19 vaccine.
While the government and epidemiologists believe Victoria is past the main peak of Omicron infections, cases are expected to rise when students return to classroom learning on Monday.
Health officials are urging parents to get children aged five to 11 years vaccinated before school begins and the government has opened more pop-up vaccination clinics across Victoria.
- ABC
