Two Wollongong men have died with COVID while the Illawarra Shoalhaven has hit a record number of new COVID-19 cases.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
The men who lost their lives were aged in their 70s and 80s, and both were vaccinated.
They were among 20 deaths reported by NSW Health on Saturday, including that of a man in his 20s who was vaccinated and had serious underlying health conditions.
Five Wollongong residents have died with COVID in four days.
Another 2196 new cases were reported in the 24 hours to 8pm Friday: 1254 were from the Wollongong local government area, 407 were from Shellharbour, 77 were from Kiama, and 458 were from Shoalhaven.
All these cases were detected by PCR testing.
Meanwhile, there are 105 COVID patients in Illawarra Shoalhaven LHD hospitals.
Across NSW there were 48,768 positive cases recorded in the 24 hours to Friday night: 27,020 PCR results and 21,748 from rapid antigen tests.
Of the RAT results, 15,925 were from the previous seven days.
A geographical breakdown of RAT results has not yet been made available.
Over 2500 people are in hospital with COVID, with 193 people in intensive care and 58 on ventilators.
Almost 9 per cent of five to 11-year-olds have now had a first dose of the COVID vaccine, five days into the vaccination program for this age group.
The Illawarra Mercury newsroom is funded by our readers. You can subscribe to support our journalism here.
Sign up for breaking news emails below...