As a coronavirus sub-variant-fueled outbreak spreads throughout the nation, hospital admissions for COVID-19 in Australia have increased to a new high for a second straight day, according to data released on Tuesday. The daily death toll also increased to its second-highest level.
Almost 5,600 COVID patients are being treated in hospitals, and 100 fresh fatalities have been reported, falling just shy of Saturday’s record of 102 fatalities.
Over the past seven days, there have been close to 330,000 infections registered, but experts believe the actual figure might be twice that high.
The leader of the hard-hit Queensland state, Annastacia Palaszczuk, stated, “It’s time to band together again and fight: get vaccinated, use a mask in crowds and inside, and stay home if you’re sick.”
According to modeling done by the state’s health agency, late August should see a peak in the number of patients in Queensland, which is now dealing with the pandemic’s worst epidemic.
The problem is becoming worse as hospital admissions increase and more front-line personnel are absent or isolated.
According to Palaszczuk, hospitals will expand their capacity and assign more workers to front-line positions.
According to Premier Daniel Andrews, more than 8% of the workforce in Victoria state’s health sector, or roughly 10,000 workers, are absent due to illness.
Australia, like many other nations, abandoned its strictest coronavirus measures and has been infected since the beginning of this year.
Authorities are fighting demands to reinstall them, including requests for masks to be required indoors from certain doctors.
Instead, they’ve urged companies to permit employees to work from home and advised consumers to obtain booster doses right away.
An estimated 9.2 million COVID cases and 11,300 fatalities have been reported in the nation of around 26 million people.
