Victoria

Officials say people have been catching the virus from "fleeting" encounters in a Melbourne outbreak of the B.1.617.1 strain, now named the Kappa variant by the World Health Organization.

Australia's second most-populous state will now be locked down until 10 June.

It's the fourth shutdown endured by residents so far in the pandemic.

Six new local cases were reported on Wednesday, taking the cluster to 60.

"I know this is not the news that everybody wants to hear but given the cases we have... the government had no choice," said Acting Premier James Merlino.

A total of nine local cases were recorded on Monday, which included six flagged by the government at its daily Covid-19 press conference yesterday.

The state recorded 42,699 test results and 20,484 vaccinations at state-run centres.

There are now 329 exposure sites, with the South Melbourne ALDI, the Woolworths at Heidelberg and a number of sites in Brimbank Shopping Centre added last night as Tier 1 sites.

Federal Aged Care Services Minister Richard Colbeck said he was comfortable with the pace of the vaccine roll out in aged care.

Aboriginal Australians were dispossessed of their land after British settlement in 1788 and have since endured systemic injustices.

Unlike some other Commonwealth nations, Australia has never formally examined the full impact of past policies.

The state government said a proper examination was long overdue.

"Today has been owed for 233 years," it said in a joint statement with indigenous leaders on Tuesday.

"233 years of violence, dispossession and deprivation. 233 years of deliberate silence. Today we commit to telling the truth."

The department said the man worked at the Holiday Inn hotel at Melbourne Airport, and it was contacting the hotel along with the case's close contacts.

The worker returned a negative test result on 4 February and returned to work on 7 February, where they developed symptoms and tested positive.

"We are contacting Holiday Inn Airport workers and others who are considered primary close contacts," the department said.

"They are required to immediately isolate, get tested and remain isolated for 14 days."

Warning in NSW

Sunday will be the hottest in the north-west with temperatures predicted to soar to around 44 degrees Celsius in Mildura, six hours north-west of Melbourne, as the heat begins to build.

A mass of hot air is being strengthened by a cyclone brewing off the West Australian coast.

"Monday will be the warmest day for much of Victoria including the Melbourne area," said Diana Eadie, from the Bureau of Meteorology.

"We're expecting the temperature to be around 41 or 42 degrees.

At the stroke of midnight, police vehicles joined the ends of queues at each border checkpoint to mark the midnight closure. Travellers were told earlier on Friday they would need to be in line before 11:59pm in order to make it home.

"At midnight, regardless of how long the queue is, we'll have a police car go to the end of that queue," Victoria Police Deputy Commissioner Rick Nugent said earlier.

"If you are there by midnight, regardless of whether you're actually processed, you're included as arriving prior to midnight."

At the stroke of midnight, police vehicles joined the ends of queues at each border checkpoint to mark the midnight closure. Travellers were told earlier on Friday they would need to be in line before 11:59pm in order to make it home.

"At midnight, regardless of how long the queue is, we'll have a police car go to the end of that queue," Victoria Police Deputy Commissioner Rick Nugent said earlier.

"If you are there by midnight, regardless of whether you're actually processed, you're included as arriving prior to midnight."

Victoria, which imposed a tough lockdown after a surge in cases, has reported no new infections since the beginning of November.

The state is also relaxing its rules on wearing face masks.

Australia has recorded about 900 deaths and 28,000 infections in total.

The country has relied on lockdowns, widespread testing and aggressive contact tracing to push daily infections nationwide close to zero.

Australia shut down its international borders early in the pandemic and requires all arriving travellers to spend two weeks in quarantine in designated hotels.

There are now just four active cases in Victoria.

Two of those are 'mystery' cases with an unknown source of infection.

Health authorities carried out 10,653 Covid-19 tests in the past 24 hours.

Premier Daniel Andrews yesterday lifted restrictions across a number of industries, as well as easing some of the limits on social gatherings in Melbourne.

Gyms, cinemas and libraries have been cleared to reopen, but with strict limits on the number of patrons.

Melbourne's 14-day rolling average for new cases has now fallen to 3.6, and there are seven "mystery" cases.

In regional Victoria the average remains at 0.2.

It is the first day since June 9 that no new cases of COVID-19 have been recorded in Victoria.

Victoria’s commander of testing and community engagement, Jeroen Weimar, said 2,100 tests had been processed from the northern suburbs from yesterday and hundreds more would go through laboratories today.