Australians are being urged to stay calm as federal and state governments respond to exploding COVID-19 cases across the country.
On Wednesday the first national cabinet meeting of the year resulted in changes to testing requirements and the promise of more rapid antigen tests hitting the shelves.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison said state and territory leaders rejected the idea of free rapid tests for all, instead agreeing to provide 10 free tests for the more than six million concession card holders in Australia.
For other Australians, 200 million rapid test kits will be available over the next two months.
Retailers caught hiking up prices by more than 20 per cent could face a penalty of $66,000 and up to five years in jail.
National leaders also agreed to limit the number of tests people can buy to one box of either two or five tests at a time.
Also, people with a positive rapid antigen test will no longer be required to get a PCR test.
Truck drivers will not have to be tested regularly and international arrivals will not have to get multiple tests.
“This virus will continue to challenge us and it is important that we all remain calm,” Mr Morrison said.
“We have no choice but to ride the wave.
“We have to keep working through the problems and dealing with the challenges presented.”
Getting children back to school for the first term of 2022 is one such challenge on the horizon.
Mr Morrison said in the next fortnight a final set of recommendations on schools returning would be presented to national cabinet.
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The national framework will cover testing arrangements, staff isolation issues, health and safety and vaccination rates in schools to ensure as few disruptions to the term as possible.
National cabinet was also due to consider whether to change the criteria for who is included in hospitalisation figures, but a decision was not reached on Wednesday.
Chief Medical Officer Paul Kelly said there was still plenty of spare capacity in hospitals and despite the high case numbers few people were in ICU.
“We’re seeing very large numbers of cases but very, very few people with severe illness and this is the nature of Omicron,” he said.
More than 64,000 COVID cases were reported nationally on Wednesday, the highest daily number since the pandemic began.
NSW registered a high of 35,054 cases and eight deaths, while there 17,636 cases and another 11 deaths in Victoria.
Tasmania had a record of 867 infections, with Queensland reaching 6781, SA with 3493, the ACT with 810, NT 117 and WA 16.
