Surge in Omicron COVID cases causing Christmas stress in Canberra

Health Minister Rachel Stephen-Smith said yesterday 40 ACT residents in total now had the highly infectious Omicron strain.

In addition with the ACT dropping quarantine requirements for fully vaccinated international travellers and domestic health restrictions remaining unchanged on Monday, many locals are feeling on edge.

Gilda Dornan has been increasingly anxious about the latest variant and the risks associated with it, saying that everything should be closing for Christmas.

"I'm just staying home in Canberra this Christmas, I think we should all look after our families and everyone important to us to prevent COVID from spreading," Ms Dornan said.

"My son is currently in hotel quarantine with COVID, we went to Sydney to see him but obviously couldn't go in and then we had to test for COVID ourselves because we were at an exposure site so it's all very stressful.

"Considering Sydney cases are now at the 2000s, I'm doing my Christmas shopping and am hoping to do it in a hurry. I'm getting the most basic things like T-shirts, I'm not even stopping to get toys.

"Christmas is very painful for me at the moment so it's going to be a quiet one this year."

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Richard Zhang and Cathy Zhu are feeling a bit more optimistic, having just touched down from Chongqing, China on December 14 to study their PhDs in engineering at the Australian National University.

"Compared to China, we did have limited cases, especially Omicron because there were very strict regulations for the border and for international travellers coming into the country," Mr Zhang said.

"But we aren't actually that nervous about Canberra because we're fully vaccinated and we always wear a mask when we go to public places.

"I'm also feeling optimistic because it seems from what the news has been saying, Omicron isn't as severe as the Delta strain if you catch it.

"The population here is also a lot smaller than China, so there's much more space in Canberra compared to Chongqing," Ms Zhu said.

"Australia has just let international students come here and the visa took 18 months to process so we're glad we can study in a nice warm country which is more spacious."

Small businesses are also gearing up for the increasing transmission of Omicron, yet Erin Harris, the store manager for McGlades Jewellers, says this hasn't stopped the flow of Christmas shoppers.

"We've had a lot more people than usual in the last two weeks due to the Christmas rush which we did suspect, so it doesn't seem people are too stressed about rising case numbers," Ms Harris said.

"While as a business you never know what could happen which makes things a little stressful, I think our customers have all felt pretty safe. We have a lot of people coming in with masks but everyone seems OK and there hasn't been a lot of discussion about COVID."

"It's likely because we've been dealing with this for so long now already, we also follow all the health guidelines and keep up with hygiene and we're used to having to change things and adjust."

Ms Harris also notes the flexible position the jewellery shop is in and their ability to stay resilient during previous lockdowns.

"We've been really lucky throughout the pandemic, towards the end of the second lockdown we were allowed to have appointments for people to come in and select jewellery," Ms Harris said.

"We have lots of space inside so it makes customers feel more comfortable, so it's made us feel a lot less stressed compared to other businesses."

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