Further restrictions in NSW, Victoria as COVID-19 cases continue to rise; Novak Djokovic to stay in the country until at least Monday

Up to 6000 people could be in hospital with COVID-19 by the end of the month under new modelling released by NSW Health.

That worst-cases scenario hospitalisation figure is based on New York’s experience with Omicron. If current parameters are applied, authorities predict more than 4500 people will be in hospital by the end of the month.

Under conditions seen in London, there would be more than 3000 in hospital at the same point. There were 1738 people in hospital with the virus as of 8pm last night, according to NSW Health.

“Based on this information at the moment – and, again, it is a model and we will need to continue to monitor it – we believe, by the middle of February, we will be certainly well past the peak of this,” NSW Health Deputy Secretary Susan Pearce said during today’s COVID-19 update.

“And we expect that peak to occur in around the third to the last week of January. So we reiterate, we have got some challenging weeks ahead of us.”

Under the worst-case scenario, authorities say ICU admissions will peak at 600 people. Under current parameters that figure would be 273, while when London’s experience is applied there would be 270 ICU admissions.

There are currently 134 patients with coronavirus in intensive care in NSW.