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Health

Victoria's COVID-19 pandemic declaration to end next Wednesday night, isolation requirement to lift early

Victoria's pandemic declaration will come to an end at 11:59pm next Wednesday night, the state government has announced.

The pandemic declaration is the legal instrument that allows the government to enforce pandemic health measures such as quarantine and was already due to expire on October 12.

The government said the expiration of the declaration would also mean mandatory isolation would end for Victorians from Thursday.

The isolation requirement is due to end nationally on Friday, October 14.

Meeting this date would have required Victoria to extend its declaration for 24 hours.

Isolation for positive cases will be strongly recommended.

Victoria has seen a stark drop in COVID cases since the end of winter, with active cases dropping nearly 90 per cent from a peak of 71,428 on July 23 to 7,415 cases on Friday.

However, authorities have previously noted the proportion of people with COVID-19 actually getting tested has been dropping.

The seven-day rolling average of patients with COVID-19 in Victorian hospitals is 137, down 5.5 per cent when compared to the same time last week.

The number of COVID-19 patients hospitalised in the BA.5 wave peaked at 906 on July 20.

Vaccines mandates to remain for healthcare workers

Premier Daniel Andrews said vaccination mandates for health workers would remain in place through health directions.

Other industries will also be able to maintain mandatory vaccines if employers deem it necessary under health and safety laws. 

"We don't want this getting into aged care if we can avoid it, we certainly don't want this getting into disability services, and we want to keep people well that are in hospital and COVID makes it very challenging," the Premier said.

In Victoria, 94.8 per cent of people aged 12 and over have had two doses of a COVID-19 vaccine, while 70 per cent of people aged 16 and over have had their third dose.

The Victorian government had been slowly winding back its few remaining pandemic restrictions.

On Tuesday, the government announced that due to high vaccination rates in the community the purpose-built quarantine hub at Mickleham will close next week.

In September, the requirement to wear masks on public transport was dropped.

The work-from-home recommendation had been lifted weeks earlier.

Further COVID variants detected in Victoria

The health department said it was continuing to monitor the emergence of new subvariants of the Omicron strain.

Wastewater testing has revealed the Omicron BA.4/BA.5 sub-variants of COVID-19 remain the dominant strains in Victoria.

However authorities have also detected new Omicron BA.2 sub-lineages, BA.2.75 and BA.2.75.2  in both metro and regional areas at low levels.

The government said there was no evidence to suggest these sub-lineages caused more severe disease.

Other BA.2 and BA.5 sub-lineages have also been detected at low levels but are not widespread.

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