Three new COVID-19 cases in NSW

New South Wales has recorded three new cases of coronavirus in the past 24 hours.

All three are from Sydney's western suburbs and two are from the same household.

Premier Gladys Berejiklian has thanked the more than 32,000 people who came forward for testing.

"We are really keen to make sure that everybody in the Greystanes, Berala, Auburn and Lidcombe areas comes forward to get testing even if it is the mildest of symptoms," Ms Berejiklian said.

NSW Chief Health Officer Dr Kerry Chant said none of the three new cases were linked to the Avalon cluster on Sydney's Northern Beaches.

"The source of the two of these cases, a man in his 40s and a man in his 20s, are under investigation and the third case, a man in his 20s, is a close household contact of one of the cases," Dr Chant said.

Ms Berejiklian also announced news of additional cases from Victoria.

"It has also come to our attention literally in the last few minutes that there were a couple of cases from Victoria that came in two venues in Bega and the Bermagui areas," Ms Berejiklian said.

"We understand that there were two cases from Victoria that came up and have gone to venues and events in Bermagui.

"The strong message from us is to be on high alert, come forward and get tested with the mildest of symptoms."

NSW Health is due to update its list of venues this morning.

Missing link between clusters

Dr Chant also revealed a so-called missing link between the Croydon cluster, in Sydney's Inner West, and Wollongong.

"Investigations have revealed that a case from the Croydon cluster and a case from the Wollongong cluster both attended the Swallowed Anchor restaurant in Wollongong on the 19 December … there may have been a transmission event at that venue," she said.

"This was before either the case from Croydon cluster or the case from Wollongong had their infection, and what we're looking at is whether they were both infected at that time and date, so this is a triangulation piece.

"It may turn out to not be case but for the abundant caution, everyone at that venue on the 19th of December needs to immediately get tested and isolate.

"Genomic testing had now proven a link between the Avalon, Croydon and Wollongong clusters, she said.

Dr Chant pleaded for people across Wollongong, Sydney's west and southern NSW to come forward for testing.

The two positive travellers from Victoria visited the Great Southern Hotel at Eden on December 30.

"We understand that there may be a lot of visitors who have travelled to that part over the festive season."

Sydney restrictions update

Ms Berejiklian says the government would be "adjusting the settings" in relations to restrictions across Sydney.

"I made that very clear. Especially the southern side of the Northern Beaches will feel some relief tomorrow. We'll be making announcements in that regard. We will still have in place the main stay-at-home provisions for the northern zone until the of January," she said.

"Given the date we have identified is getting longer and longer, it gives us greater heart that most if not all about community transmission has really been stomped out in that region.

"Once you know you have got that and put that to bed, you can obviously focus all your resources into the growing number of cases in Western Sydney.

"I can confirm that our local members and our treasurer has also been engaging with the chambers of commerce in the Northern Beaches to see what support the New South Wales government can consider and we are certainly considering our options in that regard."

The premier said no restrictions would be put into place banning people in NSW from travelling to regional areas.

"So long as people are COVID safe…we're not going to stop people from visiting different parts of the state but we do ask people to be extra careful," she said.

"We do ask people to take extra precautions.

"The direction is reduce your mobility, be extra safe, but we are not putting on any further restrictions at this stage unless the health advice changes."

Border closures

Ms Berejiklian said she understood the actions taken to block NSW residents from entry.

"The strategy we have taken is how can we maintain public health and safety without putting unnecessary stress on our citizens and that is a fine balance we have been adopting in New South Wales and when the situation in Victoria was quite severe some months ago, we waited until Victorian cases were consistently above 120 before we closed our border and that is the decision we took," she said.

"I don't begrudge other state premiers for taking the same decision."

But, she said, "I don't think at this stage closing the border between New South Wales and Victoria is a good use of resources".

The premier also hinted at relief for struggling businesses in the Northern Beaches.

New Year's Eve policing

NSW Police has thanked the community for largely obeying coronavirus restrictions as they welcomed in the New Year.

"Policeman are generally quite pleased with the way that the operation to see in the New Year was conducted, the behaviour by and large was very good across the board and people did adhere to our request to restrict their travel and not come into the CBD," Assistant Commissioner Mick Willing said.

"The CBD area itself was as quiet as we will ever see it and our marine area command estimate that on the harbour there was approximately 20 per cent of the vessels that we would normally see during a New Year's Eve operation.

"But outside the CBD and in the suburbs, police were kept busy, he said.

"They attended a lot of residential premises following up reports of breaches but by and large, beyond that, a lot of those reports were actually false and when they did have to speak to residents, they abided by the requests of police."

The riot squad was called in to break up large crowds watching an illegal fireworks display in Villawood, activity that left police "a little disappointed".

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