Health officials are urging people to take personal responsibility for their own health measures, as the ACT government has moved to relax quarantine requirements.
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While the ACT's acting chief health officer has expressed confidence in the territory's current restrictions, Dr Vanessa Johnston has urged people to be cautious and wear masks in certain settings to help curb the spread of COVID-19.
She said it was important that the public health response was proportionate. However, another expert has warned public health measures may likely need to be adjusted across Australia if the threat level from Omicron increases.
It comes as close contacts of Omicron cases in the ACT will now only need to isolate for seven days, instead of 14. This is in line with the requirements for all other close contacts.
But ACT health authorities have introduced new guidelines for all COVID-19 close contacts which will need to be adhered to in the week after quarantine.
Under the measures people are being asked to limit their movement as much as possible in the eight to 14 days after being exposed to a COVID case.
Dr Johnston said this meant avoiding mass gatherings, social events and public transport. The guidelines will also ask people to wear masks in all indoor settings outside of the home.
"We need to further encourage positive COVID safe behaviours to protect our community as much as possible from seeding events," Dr Johnston said.
"This is especially important given how quickly we've seen the spread of Omicron cases take off in NSW from a very small number of exposure events and sites."
But Dr Johnston has also told Canberrans to take heed of their own health measures and maintain vigilance, particularly over the Christmas period.
"For all of us, we too can wear a face mask not only where it's required like on public transport but in indoor settings where it's hard to maintain physical distancing," she said.
"That's certainly the case as we go about doing our Christmas shopping at very busy retail outlets and malls."
Epidemiologist and Aspen Medical group medical director Andrew Jeremijenko said individuals and companies should also be implementing measures to stop the spread.
"It is important that companies and individuals keep updated and adjust their risk to match the threat level," Dr Jeremijenko said.
"Companies may consider a risk management strategy such as a vaccine booster plus strategy of testing, masks, ventilation and vaccination passports. It is important to protect employees and reduce the risk of transmission in the workplace."
Dr Jeremijenko said there was concern that the current plan to ease restrictions across the country would see Omicron spread and governments may need to tighten restrictions to tackle this.
"Omicron is an evolving threat and public health measures may need to adjust as the threat level changes," he said.
"Australians are lucky to have avoided the high death rates per capita seen overseas. They have had time to get vaccinated and now can get booster shots. We will likely see the threat evolve overseas and adjust accordingly as evidence grows."
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NSW had a significant spike in cases on Wednesday, recording 1360 new infections - the highest daily total since September. NSW Health Minister Brad Hazzard warned that modelling showed the state could reach 25,000 daily cases by the end of January.
Dr Johnston said the ACT would record more Omicron cases and could possibly see a spike in cases. However, she said the dynamics in the ACT were a lot different.
"We will see Omicron cases ... the national modellers don't have enough data yet to differentiate the effective reproduction rate of Delta versus Omicron but it seems that once it is seeded into a community the doubling time is perhaps around two to three days," she said.
"But the transmission pressures in a large city like Sydney are very different to another smaller, more spaced out, greener city such as Canberra."
The ACT reported seven new COVID-19 cases on Wednesday. There have been 14 Omicron cases in the territory, but one case has recovered.
Alongside eased quarantine requirements for close contacts, the ACT government has also dropped all domestic travel restrictions. The 14-day quarantine requirement for nine countries in southern Africa has also been abandoned.
However, returned international travellers will still need to isolate for three days upon entry to the territory.
There will not be any further changes to the ACT's restrictions until next month, unless there is a significant development, Dr Johnston said.
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