COVID-19 response commander Jeroen Weimar.Credit:Jason South
Around 1.7 percent of all positive cases in Victoria had possible indicators for Omicron at the end of last week,but analysis of every single positive COVID-19 result ceased from Thursday.
“So quite a low proportion compared to the proportions that New South Wales and South Australia are reporting at this point in time,we’re not doing such full-on screening anymore,” he said.
“But that we know that Omicron is established in our community,we don’t need to keep doing more and more sampling of all those positive cases.
“We know Omicron is here,we know it will spread more easily,we know it’s got a higher attack rate than Delta. We’ll follow it very closely over the days ahead.”
People queue at the COVID-19 testing site at the Melbourne Town Hall on Boxing Day.Credit:Joe Armao
Victoria has recorded 1608 new cases in the past day and two deaths.
After NSWrecorded 6394 new cases on Boxing Day,the state’s Health Minister Brad Hazzard said everyone “is probably going to get Omicron at some stage”.