Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk denies "scaremongering" about reopening the country to COVID-19 and says national cabinet is awaiting modelling on hospital capacity and children.
The premier read from articles from US publications about child hospitalisation rates in state parliament on Thursday as she warned about the impacts of opening to COVID-19 when 80 per cent vaccination coverage was reached.
Ms Palaszczuk says the Doherty Institute modelling shows testing, tracing, isolation and quarantine measures as well as potential lockdowns will still be needed to contain the virus going forward.
She says Prime Minister Scott Morrison is seeking new modelling on the impact of opening up on unvaccinated children 12 and under.
She denies scaremongering about kids, saying she wants national cabinet to have an "educated and responsible conversation" about the topic.
"Not at all, not at all, you know I think this is about protecting Queenslanders, and having a conversation about what will we need to do," Ms Palaszczuk told reporters.
"And you know, there's measures that other countries are putting in place. For example if the Delta variant is going rampant through a particular region or a city, the children in primary school wearing masks as a precaution. So what do we need to do."
She said new modelling on hospital capacity was set to be presented to national cabinet on Friday afternoon.
"These are real issues and I think as a nation, we can come up with the answers, but rather than attacks, let's have a conversation," she said.
Deputy Premier Steven Miles said the federal government was trying to simplify the conversation to being about those who wanted to open the country at 80 per cent and those that never want it to open.
Queensland's vaccination coverage, which is currently 51.6 per cent for one dose and 32.9 per cent fully vaccinated, is the second lowest in the country.
He also accused the federal government of a "pile on" against his state because of the upcoming federal election.
"It's clear the prime minister has both his eyes on his own election, and no eyes on the outbreak ripping through Sydney right now," Mr Miles said.
Earlier, the deputy premier said national cabinet needed come to an agreement on the number of deaths leaders were willing to accept to reopen.
"That's effectively the decision that needs to be made here," Mr Miles told ABC radio on Friday.
"The modelling calculates how many people die under each scenario, and that's the challenging decision that our leaders need to make, and I don't think they can be simplified the way the prime minister has tried to."
Mr Miles said until a clear decision had been made by national cabinet, Queensland couldn't commit to reopening when other state leaders may be willing to accept more cases, hospitalisations, ICU cases and deaths.
The deputy premier said lockdowns would be less likely at 80 per cent vaccination coverage, but decisions on borders would depend on circumstances in other states.
