Victoria has recorded a 3.4 per cent rise in new COVID cases in the past week, a sign the anticipated new wave of the virus has crested.
But hospitalisations have risen substantially in that time.
The state recorded 27,790 total cases in the past week.
There is a seven-day rolling average of 682 cases in hospital, a 24 per cent increase on last week.
Twenty-eight of those cases are in the intensive care unit.
Eighty-five Victorians died with the virus in the past week.
In total, 6132 people have died of COVID-19 in Victoria since the pandemic began, and 2.7 million have caught the disease and recovered.
Some regional areas in Victoria have a higher per capita number of cases. The Bendigo LGA has 500 active cases per 100,000 residents. Benala has 534 cases per 100,000 residents, and Ararat has 607 per 100,000 residents.
Although that is a confusing metric because neither Benala or Ararat LGAs have anywhere close to 100,000 residents.
The health department is asking for people to get tested for COVID before going to any Christmas parties, with the events known for being potential super-spreaders.
Yesterday NSW Health revealed COVID-19 cases are up 9.1 per cent this week, with 37,088 people diagnosed.
But the seven-day rolling average of hospital admissions has declined slightly.
This week there was an average of 100 people admitted to hospital with COVID-19 each day, down from 103 last week. There have been 48 new deaths in the state.
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Elsewhere, in Queensland there have been 13,632 new cases with 320 hospitalised, eight of those in ICU, and 15 new deaths.
Western Australia and South Australia have seen 12,383 and 9986 new cases respectively, with 28 and 31 deaths in each state respectively.
While other parts of the country there have seen less than 5000 new cases – Tasmania recorded 4030, the ACT had 2610 and NT has 827 new cases - with ten deaths across the three regions.
