As the number of Omicron infections escalates, so does the chorus of calls from health workers and economists for a return to tighter COVID restrictions.
The Herald stands by previous editorials that NSW must hold its nerve and push ahead with reopening but that doesn’t mean we can’t make some small but important tweaks to our COVID settings.
While Premier Dominic Perrottet has been consistent in his message that NSW needs to learn to live with the virus and open up, it would hardly represent a shameful retreat for the government to temporarily restore the indoor mask mandate, reintroduce vaccine verification and cap indoor gatherings to slow the spread of Omicron.
End-of-year parties have fuelled a dramatic rise in COVID-19 cases and testing, resulting in lengthy queues and long waits for results. Contact tracers are exhausted and pharmacists have complained they have been caught off guard in the rush for booster shots after the government revised its advice from six to five months between second and third doses.
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While the Omicron strain is showing signs that it may be less deadly than Delta, it is more infectious and the surge in cases may yet lead to higher hospital admissions, putting further pressure on already stretched health resources.
A week after Mr Perrottet removed mandates for masks and check-in requirements, and scrapped gathering density limits, he is calling on people to take personal responsibility for their health. He wants us to judge for ourselves when we should take extra precautions, such as wearing masks, advice many are heeding. However, the government should carefully guard the capacity of the health system to deal with rising COVID cases.
More than 15,000 people have become infected with COVID-19 in NSW over the past seven days, with another 2501 cases reported on Monday. There are 261 people in hospital, including 33 in intensive care. This is, thankfully, much lower than the 1266 hospitalisations recorded at the peak of the Delta outbreak in September when 244 people were being treated in intensive care wards.
Sharon Lewin, the Doherty Institute director who advised on the national plan to roll back public health restrictions, is now calling for the return of mask-wearing indoors and a temporary stop to large gatherings including in pubs and nightclubs to slow the rise in COVID infections.
In a joint statement in the Herald on Monday, Professor Lewin and Kirby Institute epidemiologists Professor John Kaldor and Professor Greg Dore called for a rethink of the reopening plans. They recommend bringing back some restrictions for a few weeks until there is more data on Omicron’s severity and its ability to evade vaccines. A two-week pause on big indoor events and a return to mask-wearing indoors could avoid tens of thousands of cases in January and a spike in hospital admissions swamping the health service.
A temporary return to masks and lower density gatherings is needed
Source: Philippines Alive
