NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian says there are 18 new community cases of Covid-19 in the state.
Health workers conduct Covid-19 tests at the St. Vincents Hospital drive-through testing clinic at Bondi Beach in Sydney 27 June, 2021. Photo: AFP / Steven Saphore
Of those, 11 people were "completely in isolation", five people were "partially in isolation", and two people "infectious in the community".
A third staff member has also tested positive to Covid-19 at the SummitCare aged care home at Baulkham Hills in Sydney's north west.
Five residents at the centre also previously tested positive to the virus.
The operator has confirmed the new infection and it says the affected staff member had been in isolation, as they worked closely with the other two infected staff.
Two thirds of staff at the centre have not been vaccinated, but the home says 96 percent of residents are vaccinated.
Too early to lift NSW lockdown, expert says
The percentage of people testing positive while infectious in the community is trending downwards, from 60 percent on 26 June to as low as 13 percent on 4 July.
However, epidemiologist Tony Blakely from the University of Melbourne said despite these promising signs, NSW did not appear ready to lift stay-at-home restrictions.
"For a lockdown to be successful, we really need to see the number of notified cases that are out in the community down to zero," Prof Blakely said.
"There's still cases popping up in the community where they've been infectious … that means there's community transmissions happening out there."
Stay-at-home orders for more than 5 million people in Greater Sydney, Wollongong, Shellharbour, the Central Coast and the Blue Mountains are due to end at midnight on 9 July.
But Prof Blakely warned it was too soon.
"If we just open up restrictions at that point, they will just take off again … that's just how the virus behaves," he said.
"It's not just a situation for NSW, the virus can move around and get across borders, so it's also an issue for the rest of Australia too."
Queensland has one new case, Victoria records no cases for sixth day
Queensland recorded one new locally-acquired case of Covid-19.
Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk said the case was linked to the existing Alpha cluster.
"She is a close contact of the man that we reported yesterday from Sinnamon Park [in Brisbane]," Palaszczuk said.
"She lives at Kangaroo Point and she is in home quarantine at the moment."
Meanwhile, Victoria has recorded its sixth day of no new local Covid-19 cases, as authorities weigh up further easing restrictions later this week.
Authorities are expected to make an announcement on Thursday about the next step out of restrictions imposed to deal with outbreaks of the Kappa and Delta variants.
-ABC