Sydney Lockdown
A woman walks past a closed restaurant amid lockdowns in Sydney, Australia.
REUTERS/Loren Elliott
  • Australia's first COVID-19 death of the year is a 90-year-old woman who died in Sydney.
  • Authorities said she caught the virus from a family member at home and believe she was unvaccinated.
  • A resurgence in cases has increased the likelihood of extended lockdowns in the state of New South Wales.
  • Visit Insider's homepage for more stories.

Australia reported its first COVID-19 death of the year on Sunday, as lockdowns continue in New South Wales, the country's most populous state, due to a Delta variant outbreak.

The 90-year-old woman died on Saturday at Liverpool hospital in Sydney, said the New South Wales Health Authority. She died several hours after testing positive for COVID-19, and caught the virus at home from an infected family member.

Authorities believe she was unvaccinated, reported The Sydney Morning Herald.

On Monday, New South Wales reported 112 new COVID-19 infections, a record high for the year, though daily case counts in March 2020 reached up to 212 infections.

With this new rise in infections, a lockdown extension in Greater Sydney is still in the cards, said State Premier Gladys Berejiklian at a televised briefing on Sunday.

"Given the lockdown was supposed to be lifted on Friday, everybody can tell it's highly unlikely at this stage, given where the numbers are," Berejiklian said.

"I can't stress enough that every time we risk breaking the rules or even just going about our business and not getting tested when we need to, the people whose lives and health that we're risking the most are those closest to us," she added.

The number of cases in the area would need to be close to zero for lockdowns to ease, she also said, per The Herald.

Australia has managed to keep its infection rate lower than most developed countries, with 30,920 coronavirus cases and 910 deaths since the start of the pandemic. However, it has only fully vaccinated around 8.9% of its 25 million population so far, compared to 47.8% in the US and 52% in the UK.

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