Australia’s two most populated states, New South Wales (NSW) and Victoria, are expected to end one of their last major COVID-19 regulations within the coming days.

At present, people in the two states who have been in close contact with a COVID-19 case must remain in home isolation for seven days. It is a rule which has hampered many businesses, especially in the retail and hospitality sectors, as they struggle to retain their staffing levels and there have subsequently been reports of groups lobbying politicians to allow those in quarantine to return to work.

Now, as the latest wave of the Omicron BA.2 variant trends downward, the NSW Premier Dominic Perrottet and his Victorian counterpart Daniel Andrews have reportedly been preparing to announce ending home quarantines.

“The seven-day average, very pleasingly, is coming down,” Andrews told reporters on Tuesday.

“So that says to me that the peak has come and gone. We just have to wait and see, though, that those few days of data turns into the trend that we hope it is.”

Senior members of NSW’s COVID and Economic Recovery Committee met on Tuesday evening, and it is understood that the easing of isolation rules was at the top of their agenda.

NSW Health Minister Brad Hazzard, in confirming the likely end of the rules, conceded that such changes would need to be managed alongside community health outcomes in the ongoing pandemic. (ANI/Xinhua)