Public Health will wait until case numbers start to significantly decrease from the BA.2 wave before bringing in major changes to Tasmania's close contact rules.
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The Tasmanian Chamber of Commerce and Industry and the Tasmanian Small Business Council both called for workers to continue to be able to work unless they received a positive rapid antigen test, effectively scrapping close contact rules.
Some businesses are already exempt from the rules, and the business lobby groups wanted this to apply to all.
Director of Public Health Mark Veitch said he was "open" to considering changes, but this was unlikely to occur until the end of April.
"The risk is that at the moment when there's a lot of COVID around, is if you take out that measure of quarantine which is the best way of preventing onward transmission, you may actually make the situation worse for businesses rather than better, by enabling people to - if you like - skip quarantine," he said.
"And the experience of a number of countries overseas that have dropped quarantine are seeing quite steep spikes in case numbers.
"Some of the other mainland Australian states have done some modelling that suggests that the consequences of premature dropping of quarantine requirements could make things worse rather than better."
Chief health officers in the Australian Health Protection Principal Committee met in Sydney last week and discussed close contact rules, releasing a statement that echoed some of Dr Veitch's comments.
"AHPPC notes that scenarios and projections from some jurisdictions suggest that removing quarantine at this time may lead to higher caseloads and a reduced capacity for the health system to provide some acute and elective services," the statement reads.
The body recommended a "nationally consistent" approach to removing close contact rules, rather than states and territories going it alone.
Close contacts are defined as anyone who lives with, or stays overnight, in the same place as a positive case. This does not apply to people who have recovered from COVID in the last 12 weeks.
Those deemed close contacts must quarantine for seven days. If another COVID case emerges in the same household, that seven-day count does not reset.
Business groups want consistent approach for all
The TCCI and the TSBC believed current rules were inconsistent, as some were exempted while others had to struggle with staff shortages.
TCCI chief executive officer Michael Hailey said the rules were seeing businesses "suffer" and leaving some workers out of pocket.
"Tasmania has one of the highest vaccination rates in the world and while the COVID infection rate is high, hospitalisations and those in ICU are low, so it is time to more forward," he said.
Tasmania recorded 2108 new cases of COVID on Friday, a reduction from 2478 on Thursday. Active cases continued to increase, from 12,480 to 12,883.
The number of people in hospital with COVID increased from 29 to 30, while people being treated specifically for COVID remained at 12.
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