Hospitality venues across NSW will continue to operate under current restrictions with the lockdown extended by one week.
In the Greater Sydney, Blue Mountains, Central Coast, Shellharbour and Wollongong areas, restaurants, cafés and pubs will be restricted to takeaway service only.
Stay-at-home orders will remain in place in these areas, with people only allowed to leave the house for one of six reasons: to obtain food or essential goods and services, to attend work or education (where it’s not possible to do so at home), to seek medical care or supplies (including to receive a COVID-19 vaccination), to provide care or assistance to a vulnerable person, to attend a funeral or memorial service, or to exercise outdoors in groups of 10 or fewer.
For hospitality venues in regional NSW, all patrons must be seated and the four-square-metre density rule applies.
Masks are mandatory in all indoor non-residential settings across all of NSW.
The lockdown was scheduled to lift at 11.59pm on Friday, but has been extended by a week as health authorities grapple with the highly infectious Delta COVID-19 strain circulating in the community. The extended lockdown is expected to last until 12.01am on Saturday 17 July.
NSW recorded 27 new locally acquired cases of COVID-19 overnight.
In a press conference this morning, NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian expressed her desire for the current lockdown to be the state’s last, and pointed to increased vaccination rates as the key to saving lives and keeping the economy open.
“Every time we make a decision in the pandemic it is two-fold,” she said.
“It is yes, to keep our citizens safe and healthy but it is also to give our businesses the best opportunities moving forward and we know what businesses need is certainty, and what they don’t want is a prospect or a future where we are constantly moving in and out of lockdown.”
