Sydney's south west could be put under tighter Covid-19 restrictions

The growing number of Covid-19 cases in Sydney could force authorities to split the city in half - tightening lockdowns in the virus-ravaged south-west while the rest of the city roams free.

Gladys Berejiklian's government have been left scratching their heads looking for a way to tackle consistently high case numbers in the state without tanking Sydney's economy by keeping business owners and consumers in lockdown until September.

Stay-at-home orders have been in place for almost five weeks, but New South Wales still recorded 145 new cases on Monday including 76 people who were active in the community while infectious.  

With lockdown set to end on July 30, members of a five-hour crisis cabinet meeting on Monday deliberated over whether to strengthen restrictions only in areas hit hardest by the virus - such as Fairfield, Canterbury-Bankstown and Liverpool. 

There were also conversations about whether to ease public health orders the Northern Beaches, Wollongong and Shellharbour - all of which have not seen any new cases in about a month.

Government sources told The Australian that they are not allowed to speak about the meeting, but they did say regions around Orange, in the state's Central West, would emerge from a week-long lockdown at 11.59pm on Tuesday - as originally planned.

Attendees were allowed to deliberate on their positions overnight, with key decisions set to be made on Tuesday.

Economic modelling commissioned by Treasurer Dominic Perrottet projected the fallout of keeping the city locked down until mid-September would result in mass job losses.

Other members of the crisis cabinet, including the state's chief health officer Kerry Chant, would like a restrained approach and told reporters on Monday that restrictions should stay 'as tight as possible'.

At a press conference on Monday, Ms Berejiklian remained tight-lipped about what lockdown will look like post July 30, but she said risk factors would be weighed against residents' freedoms.

'Our mission is to keep the community as safe as possible, but also to make sure we allow the community to live as freely as we can as well,' she said.

'There's no doubt that some restrictions have better effects than others, and that is the advice we'll get from our health experts in consultation with other officials.' 

On Tuesday morning it was revealed that a five-storey apartment building in Blacktown, in the city's south-west, is in lockdown with more than 100 people isolating after several people inside the complex tested positive.

The unit block is under police guard with a mass testing operation underway after the building on Devitt Street was listed as a high-risk exposure site.

Officials discovered several cases inside the flats are linked, leading to New South Wales Health taking over, with pathology teams onsite and further calls for vaccines to be prioritised for the area.

A resident of the building said everyone inside is 'so stressed' after nurses descended en masse, quickly performing swabs on the 50 units.

'My kids can't go to school, we can't go out for two weeks and I can't work,' the woman told the Telegraph.

Despite the concentration of cases in the city's south-west, of most concern to contact tracers on Monday night was an entire shopping centre in Campsie, which was exposed to the virus for 11 days between Wednesday July 14 and Saturday July 24.  

The shopping complex has become the scene of multiple transmissions of the virus, forcing thousands of shoppers and staff into isolation. 

It was one of a whopping 67 new exposure sites listed by health officials on Monday night, including supermarkets, takeaways and chemists. 

The 67 Covid exposure sites are mostly clustered across the west and south-western suburbs of Sydney, but with some concerning venues in the Central Coast.

Five people from a household in Budgewoi have tested positive to the virus, sparking a list of exposure sites 100km from Sydney. 

Another person living in the home, who tested negative but should have been isolating, is understood to have visited 25 different shops in just five days. 

Several venues in Tuggerah and Sam Remo on the Central Coast were visited by infected people, including Westfield Coles, Dan Murphy's and Smokemart.

Among the most concerning health alerts was the Campsie Centre Shopping Mall, with anyone who visited on the days listed at any time now considered a close contact and having to immediately get tested and isolate for 14 days, regardless of the result. 

The exposure is likely to plunge thousands into isolation.  

'This venue was visited by confirmed cases of Covid-19 and onwards transmission has been detected,' NSW Health confirmed.  

Among the huge number of other venues added to the ever-growing list was the Lobster Tail Fish Market in Bankstown Central, Prospect and Seven Hills Woolworths, Fairfield Coles, Paramatta Centrelink and T2 of Sydney's Domestic Airport.

It comes amid renewed calls for Sydneysiders to go out and get the Covid vaccine, with pharmacists now able to offer AstraZeneca to people over 40 without a referral from their doctor.

Key workers at supermarkets across the Covid-ravaged south-west suburbs are also being offered priority access to the Pfizer vaccine. 

Chief Health Officer Dr Kerry Chant said the number of unvaccinated people over the age of 60 is 'distressing' and urged everyone in the age bracket to make an appointment immediately. 

It is not yet known if the two latest deaths announced on Monday, a man and a woman both in their 80s, had received a jab or if they had any underlying medical conditions. 

The woman's body was found at a home in Pendle Hill in the south-west where a family had recently had an illegal gathering to mourn the loss of a different relative. 

FIND THE LATEST EXPOSURE SITES NEAR YOU

'When I review the numbers, to see how few over even 60-year-olds and over 70-year-olds we have managed to reach,' Dr Chant said.

'For me, anyone who is over 60 or over 70 should be going to their doctor as a matter of urgency, or their pharmacist which will be opening up across the state in coming days and get a dose of vaccine.'

Dr Chant speculated that NSW could administer more than 350,000 vaccines a day if there were no issues with supplies, but that the state would have to make do with the current shortage of Pfizer. 

'There are priority groups, some of which are the responsibility of the Commonwealth, such as disability and aged care that we want to make sure are absolutely vaccinated,' she said. 

She also said the jab will be available on a walk-in basis in some health clinics in an effort to target vulnerable groups, in a policy shift that will be announced on Tuesday.

It is unclear as to whether people under

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