Australians urged to prepare for COVID-safe Christmas

ABC NEWS (Australia)

Australians are facing another covid wave in the lead-up to Christmas. Case numbers appear to be creeping higher as festivities ramp up. But chief medical officer Paul Kelly says this wave is less severe.

Transcript

00:00 We're certainly in another COVID wave. We'd call this the sixth Omicron wave. That's where

00:08 most of our cases have been since Omicron hit these shores at the end of 2021. Earlier

00:13 this year, I think we talked about what my predictions were for 2023, and I said we'd

00:18 probably have two to three waves, and this is our third one for this year. Each of the

00:22 waves have been less severe in terms of hospitalisations, outbreaks in aged care, ICU and so on. But

00:31 we're certainly in a wave right now. My sense is that we've probably peaked and will start

00:36 to decrease, but of course we are in the festive season. There's lots of parties and so forth,

00:42 and so that possibility that transmission will happen is certainly there. Each of the

00:48 waves we've had this year have had less hospitalisations, lower numbers of outbreaks in aged care, lower

00:54 deaths in aged care. But people have died of COVID this year, and that's very sad, but

01:00 only about a third of the numbers from 2022. That was our big year in terms of that severe

01:07 end of COVID. But it's important that people over the age of 75 in particular take the

01:14 latest ATAGI advice, which is to get a second booster for this year of the vaccine. And

01:20 there is a new vaccine that will be available from next Monday, so people can book in to

01:26 get that XBB vaccine, the latest version from Pfizer and from Moderna.

01:32 [BLANK_AUDIO]

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