Byron Bay and surrounding LGAs will enter a seven-day lockdown from 6pm tonight amid fears COVID-19 may be circulating in the regional areas.

The stay-at-home orders come after a man in his 50s – who travelled from locked down Sydney to Byron Bay – tested positive to COVID-19.

The NSW Government this afternoon confirmed the LGAs of Byron Shire, Richmond Valley, Lismore and Ballina will enter lockdown until 12.01am Tuesday, August 17.

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The restrictions for the areas will be the same as those already in place across Greater Sydney, as well as Tamworth, Armidale, Newcastle, Lake Macquarie. Maitland, Port Stephens, Singleton, Dungog, Muswellbrook and Cessnock.

"Everyone in these areas must stay at home unless they have a reasonable excuse to leave," the NSW Government statement read.

NSW Chief Health Officer Dr Kerry Chant today said officials did not have any information from the infected man's QR check-ins, which are compulsory when visiting venues.

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Dr Chant said the Byron case is understood to have travelled from Sydney at the end of July, at a time when five million people in Greater Sydney were in lockdown.

"Unfortunately this gentleman was infectious in the community for a while, he had symptoms for several days," she said.

"The gentleman himself is actually admitted to hospital at the moment."

The man and his family are being interviewed to ascertain where he travelled and visited, Dr Chant said.

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Earlier today, when asked about the potential development in Byron Bay, Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk said: "We're starting to hear some issues around that."

She said her team was waiting to "get more information" from their NSW counterparts.

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During the Queensland media briefing it was suggested a traveller from Queensland may have spent time in Lismore, a NSW town 45 kilometres west of Byron, while they were infectious.

No details of a Queensland traveller were mentioned in the NSW briefing.

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Australia now has a third COVID-19 vaccine available to combat the surge of the Delta variant, with Moderna joining AstraZeneca and Pfizer.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison announced the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) has provisionally approved the Moderna vaccine for use in Australia.

Moderna has been provisionally approved as safe to use for Australians aged 18 and over.

READ MORE: Everything you need to know about the Moderna vaccine

The Australian government has secured 25 million doses of Moderna.

Mr Morrison confirmed the Moderna vaccine will be available for use from next month. 

The first one million doses of Moderna will arrive in early September and will go to pharmacies. By the end of the year, 10 million doses of Moderna will be in the country. 

Health Minister Greg Hunt described Moderna as "the next vaccine to save lives". 

The Head of the TGA, Adjunct Professor John Skerritt, said the data for the Moderna vaccine for use in people under the age of 18 is promising. 

Provisional approval has currently only been given for Moderna's use in adults, but Professor Skerritt said this was done to speed up the rollout in Australia.

Use of Moderna for teenagers aged 12 and over is expected to be approved in the next three to four weeks. 

The vaccine requires two doses, administered 28 days apart. 

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"The vaccination service is free and it is not mandatory. That's an important principle," Mr Morrison said.  

"We are not going to seek to impose a mandatory vaccination program by the government by stealth." 

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COVID-19 and its dangerous variants have been described by one of Australia's leading doctors as a "disease of the unvaccinated".

The declaration by Dr Mark Nicholls, vice president of the Australian and New Zealand Intensive Care Society, appears backed up by the latest New South Wales Health data, which revealed just one per cent of all local cases in the state since March this year have been people who are fully vaccinated.

In the five months since March, only 16 of 2121 locally acquired cases have reported being fully vaccinated. And just four per cent of overseas acquired COVID-19 cases reported being fully vaccinated prior to arrival in Australia.

READ MORE: Coronavirus case confirmed in Byron Bay, as Sydney man breaks lockdown to travel

"Vaccination is critical to this," Dr Nicholls told Today.

"This is the disease of the unvaccinated. The more people we get vaccinated, the better for the community."

That same drumbeat – calling for people to get vaccinated – is repeated daily by the premiers and their health chiefs at state COVID-19 briefings, and the Scott Morrison government.

Dr Nicholls said real-time data from a national ICU research centre in Monash underlined how COVID-19 was almost an exclusively deadly risk to the unvaccinated.

"There's been 175 patients admitted to intensive care this year across the country," he said.

"Of the 175, 168 were not vaccinated. The remaining (seven) patients had one dose. There's been no patients in intensive care who have been fully vaccinated."

READ MORE: Four new cases in Queensland as driver infection linked to pilot

Greater Sydney is entering its seventh week of lockdown after an unvaccinated limo driver in his 60s, from Bondi in Sydney's east, was patient zero in the ongoing Delta outbreak.

The driver did not wear a mask while shuttling international air crew from high-risk countries to and from the airport.

In Queensland, an unvaccinated taxi driver in his 60s is now in the middle of a COVID-19 scare in Cairns, which is one day into a snap three-day lockdown.

The Cairns taxi driver, who was infectious in the community for 10 days, including days when he would pick up 20-30 rides, caught the virus from a marine pilot who helps guide international ships through waters off the Queensland coast.

A Sydney man who broke lockdown rules by travelling to Byron Bay in late July is now in hospital with the virus, triggering alerts in the northern rivers region and placing the area at risk of lockdown.

Queensland most hesitant in country, study finds

Research released last month from University of Melbourne found vaccine hesitancy rates were highest in Queensland, with almost one in three adults deemed hesitant.

With 14.6 per cent, NSW was least hesitant in the country, followed by Western Australia on 21 per cent and Victoria on 23 per cent.

The study found 11.8 per cent of Australian adults remain unwilling to get vaccinated.

Australia has set a target of at least 70 per cent of the population to be fully vaccinated to begin loosening a variety of restrictions, including the prospect of international travel.

Outbreaks are changing some people's minds about getting vaccinated, the study found, especially in NSW.

Just three months ago, 32.9 per cent of NSW residents were categorised as hesitant.

But that number has now dropped to 14 per cent, seven weeks into a grinding lockdown which has killed 29 people and shows little sign of abating.

Even during outbreaks, researchers found that high rates of vaccine hesitancy persist amongst those aged 18-44 (28.8%) and those in Queensland (30.9%).

READ MORE: Everything you need to know about the Moderna vaccine

A man filmed breaching lockdown and dousing Brisbane's eternal flame has been ordered to pay more than $1600 in fines.

Tim Warburton, 32, pleaded guilty to wilful damage in Brisbane Magistrates Court this morning after his friend, Ryan Mitchem, broadcast the disrespectful act on social media on June 29.

Warburton was captured jumping the fence at Anzac Square and smothering the flame with his jumper.

READ MORE: Everything you need to know about Cairns' snap three-day lockdown

"It's burning, and it's gone, perfect … no curfew anymore because the Olympic flame is gone," Mr Mitchem can be heard saying in the video.

Mr Mitchem attempted to defend the action the morning after, claiming that he was "against war" and "against countries going to other countries and stealing their resources".

Warburton presented to court without a lawyer and admitted to carrying out the act.

"It was a drunk and embarrassing mistake," he told Magistrate Anne Thacker.

"I woke up the next day and was ashamed of myself, and I handed myself in… just had a massive night, I was just very drunk and wasn't thinking if I'm being honest."

Warburton was fined $1500 and ordered to pay an extra $111 restitution, the cost of relighting the flame.

Outside court, Warburton declared that he did not need to apologise for his actions on camera and insisted that he and Mr Mitchem were not friends.

"Don't know (Mr Mitchem), don't know him … he's not my friend," Warburton said.

"I've just apologised in court.

"I don't need to apologise again, get the f— out of my face."

Warburton has one month to pay his fines with no conviction recorded.

Mr Mitchem will face court at a later date.