In breaking news, NSW has officially scrapped all Covid-19 isolation rules, meaning that people infected with Covid will no longer be mandatorily required to isolate for five days after testing positive.
Following a unanimous decision by national cabinet, all Australian states and territories will no longer be federally required to implement isolation rules, with everyone in NSW and Australia-wide seeing these requirements end as of October 14. How this will look will be left in the hands of state powers, with NSW premier Dominic Perrottet a main instigator behind this push to eradicate Covid health restrictions.
After October 14, support payments for people infected with Covid will also cease, however there will be exceptions for those who are casual workers across the sectors of aged care, disability care, hospital care and Aboriginal health care, with national cabinet agreeing to continue targeted financial assistance for all people involved in all these sectors.
This call comes off the back of the Australian government’s decision to move away from considering Covid-19 an "emergency", with prime minister Anthony Albanese saying in a statement to the ABC that an isolation mandate required government support, but now, as we move forward, things have changed, with him adding that it wasn’t feasible for government to pay support wages “forever”.
“It was always envisaged that these measures were emergency measures that were put in place”, Albanese said.
NSW will implement these changes as of Friday, October 14.