Australia has fought off waves of Covid using closed borders.
Australia has one of the lowest rates of death in the world.
The story has changed over the past week. The national tally of Omicron cases has exploded in the past few days, with New South Wales recording more cases on Friday than on Thursday.
There are four charts that show the change in case numbers.
There are new Covid cases per population.
Australia has gone from having the lowest rate of new Covid cases per population in the world to being in the top 20 countries with a population over 500,000. If it were a country, it would be in the top 10.
Australia's cases have been climbing, so have those of other countries. According to the New York Times database, the US set a global record with 488,000 cases.
It is clear that many positive cases are going un recorded in Australia, and it is important to note that countries with better testing systems are more likely to produce higher figures. Its position has changed quickly.
There are new Covid cases every 1,000 people.
The number of people in the state has exploded.
The city went from containment to explosion very quickly. A school student was the first known case of Omicron community transmission. Regional cities and rural areas have seen a rise in cases.
The wave of cases broke and forced the government to backtrack on its plan to lift the mask mandate. The seven-day rolling average is spiking vertically, with this chart showing how quickly cases grew.
The number and trend in new locally acquired cases are shown in the chart.
There are daily cases in Australia.
The number of cases has gone up in every state and territory, despite the fact that New South Wales has led the nation.
There were a national cumulative count of confirmed Covid-19 cases.
There is optimism on hospital admissions.
Prof Paul Kelly, the nation's chief medical officer, tried to calm Omicorn panic by pointing out that hospitalisations have not seen a surge.
The rates of hospital admissions, intensive care units and ventilation in Australia are very low compared to what we were seeing with Delta and other strains of the virus.
The data can be hard to track because of the lag in reporting times, but it is important to note that there is a gap between cases being recorded and hospitalisations.
The hospital numbers have not followed the case numbers. Kerry Chant, the chief health officer of New South Wales, pointed out on Friday that some of those in hospital with Covid will have been admitted for other reasons, and it is hard to disentangle the data, but those cases still add to the burden on the health service.
Hospitals by state and territory.
