New South Wales (NSW) reported eight new locally acquired Covid-19 cases in the past 24 hours, down on 15 reported one day earlier. Seven of the new cases were traced to a cluster in Sydney’s northern beachside suburbs, officials said.

“We only had eight cases of community transmission, seven of them linked directly to the Avalon cluster,” NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian told reporters.

The eighth case was a nurse who is believed to have caught the virus from a traveller returning from overseas, officials said.

The coronavirus cluster detected in Sydney’s northern beaches suburbs last week has now grown to 90 cases as authorities battle to contain the flare-up in Australia’s largest city just days before Christmas.

The state government locked down the northern beaches, home to more than 250,000 people, for five days from Saturday, prompting other states to close their borders and throwing Christmas plans for thousands of families into chaos.

The restrictions are set to be reviewed on Wednesday.

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