NSW

NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian did not mince her words yesterday when she described the past week as the "most serious moment for the state" since the pandemic began.

There have so far been 49 locally acquired COVID-19 cases in the state since a limousine driver tested positive last Wednesday, and more infections are expected to be announced at 11:00am today.

"We're dealing with a virus that is extremely contagious," Ms Berejiklian said.

Authorities believe the man, who has not been vaccinated, has been infectious since Friday.

He had not been overseas or worked in Sydney's hotel quarantine system so authorities were keeping an open mind while working to find the source of the infection, NSW chief health officer Dr Kerry Chant said.

She said authorities hoped genome sequencing would identify the source of the infection, which could be from interstate.

Chant said the man's cycle threshold (VT) values were low, which meant he had a higher viral load and was potentially more infectious.

South Australia and Queensland will remove their travel restrictions on Sunday and Monday respectively.

It comes after NSW reported 11 days without a locally acquired infection.

About 180 cases were tied to the Sydney cluster, which emerged just before Christmas and prompted nationwide travel bans on the city's residents.

"Credit to New South Wales. They got on top of their cases," said Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk on Thursday.

South Australia and Queensland will remove their travel restrictions on Sunday and Monday respectively.

It comes after NSW reported 11 days without a locally acquired infection.

About 180 cases were tied to the Sydney cluster, which emerged just before Christmas and prompted nationwide travel bans on the city's residents.

"Credit to New South Wales. They got on top of their cases," said Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk on Thursday.

There were 12,213 tests reported to 8:00pm yesterday, compared with the previous day's total of 19,959.

However the latest testing figures do not include about 6,000 negative tests which were not counted due to a minor IT issue.

NSW Health said there were no delays in communicating the negative results to those 6,000 individuals and the tests will be counted as part of tomorrow's figures.

NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian banned dancing and singing at night clubs while restricting numbers at gym classes, weddings, funerals and places of worship.

However, the five-day Cricket test match between Australia and India, scheduled to begin on Thursday, will go ahead with attendance at 50 percent capacity.

“We consider health and safety first and foremost, but we also need to think about well-being and jobs and the economy,” Berejiklian told reporters in Sydney.

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."

Acting Victorian Premier Jacinta Allan told Victorians the state would close its border to all of NSW from 2 January because of an increase in case numbers in NSW, where 10 new cases were confirmed on Thursday.

"Obviously this is going to cause some disruption for Victorians who may be holidaying, we do apologise for this disruption, however as I said, these difficult decisions are about protecting our community," she said.

"It is a decision based on the public health advice.

Argentina, who were released from a bio-secure facility in Sydney earlier this week, are keen to get some gametime before opening their campaign against the All Blacks on 14 November.

However, coach Mario Ledesma said, given most of the team had not played in more than seven months, it was more important they focused on ensuring they would be in the best possible shape to face New Zealand and the Wallabies.

Health authorities in NSW confirmed 14 new coronavirus infections in the 24 hours to 8pm yesterday.

Eleven of those are locally acquired, and all have been traced back to known clusters or cases.

Three cases of coronavirus were identified within hotel quarantine, health authorities said.

Berejiklian said the state was "on the verge of being where it was" in early July, when an infected Victorian man sparked a cluster of cases at the Crossroads Hotel in Sydney's south-west.