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Australia's coronavirus vaccination rollout will be expanded to all children aged 12 to 15 as daily case records continue to be smashed.

Cabinet's national security committee is poring over plans to include a new age group ahead of final approval from the expert immunisation panel on Friday.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison has committed to making all 12- to 15-year-olds eligible for vaccination.

"We have some interim advice, which is very favourable on that score, but we expect the final advice very soon to be consistent with that," he told reporters in Canberra on Thursday.

"That enables us to move forward with the plans that are being prepared now for some weeks."

The Australian Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation is expected to brief a national cabinet meeting of federal, state and territory leaders on Friday.

Soaring cases in NSW will also be on the agenda with another 1029 infections pushing Australia past 1100 in one day for the first time during the pandemic.

Three more deaths took the national toll to 989.

The prime minister said the fatality rate in the NSW wave was lower than last year's Victorian outbreak because vaccines were available including in aged care.

"The vaccines are doing their job," he said.

Labor leader Anthony Albanese criticised Mr Morrison for praising NSW's decision to resist a hard lockdown at the onset of the Delta strain outbreak.

"With more than 1000 cases today, why won't the prime minister accept responsibility for the consequences of his actions?" he told parliament.

Modelling by the University of Sydney estimates that by early October daily cases will peak between 1500 and 6000 across Australia under current restriction levels.

In Victoria, there were 80 new cases while the ACT reported 14.

Expanding the vaccine rollout to children will open up jabs to a further 1.2 million people.

About 220,000 children in that cohort with compromised immune systems, underlying health conditions or who are Indigenous are already eligible for the Pfizer jab.

No country has approved coronavirus vaccines for children under 12.

A national cabinet showdown is looming on the national plan to reopen gradually when vaccination coverage hits 70 and 80 per cent of Australians 16 and above.

WA Premier Mark McGowan said including children aged 12 to 15 in the thresholds needed serious consideration, while the ACT has already added the group to its immunisation figures.

Mr Morrison said the Doherty Institute - which prepared the modelling underpinning the plan - had not recommended basing targets on all people over 12.

"But that does not by implication say there is no need to vaccinate children 12 to 15."

Australia has fully vaccinated 32.3 per cent of people aged older than 15, while more than 55 per cent have received one jab.

There was a record 335,420 doses administered nationwide in the past 24 hours.

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A lockdown in regional NSW has been extended by two weeks as Deputy Premier John Barilaro warns rural communities are "a tinderbox ready to explode" with COVID-19 cases.

Premier Gladys Berejiklian says the decision was made because western NSW remained the area of most concern in the regions, while cases had stabilised in other rural areas.

"Given that acute situation in Dubbo, in particular, the region lockdown will be extended to all of regional NSW until at least midnight, Friday the 10th of September," she said on Thursday.

Most of regional NSW has been in lockdown for a fortnight.

It was due to end on Saturday, but there are now 309 cases in Dubbo in the state's west where vaccination rates are low - around six per cent in the vulnerable Indigenous community.

Twenty-four new cases were recorded in Dubbo overnight.

Local MP Dugald Sanders acknowledged a return to zero COVID cases was "unreachable" but said an extension of the lockdown would be an opportunity to get numbers lower.

Around 60 per cent of cases in the Western Local Health District are in Aboriginal people.

Wilcannia saw five new cases overnight.

Mr Barilaro said it was necessary to extend the lockdown to protect regional communities.

"We're sitting on a knife-edge. It's a tinderbox ready to explode," he said.

He apologised to communities that didn't have any new COVID-19 cases, which will be caught up in the lockdown, but said the decision would also ensure "we don't overwhelm the system".

"One of the reasons you may not have cases is because of the restrictions in place, minimising movement, because we know we're a very interconnected community in regional and rural NSW," Mr Barilaro said.

"Now is the time to stay united and work to those restrictions."

Health Minister Brad Hazzard said "everything that is done should be done and is being done" to support rural health services.

Some 18 people are hospitalised in western NSW, including one who is ventilated.

Health worker numbers have been impacted as 134 staff are forced to isolate, 21 of whom were exposed to the virus at work.

NSW Chief Health Officer Kerry Chant endorsed the extension of the regional lockdown.

"At the moment, with our stretched system, we do not want to be fighting bushfires on multiple fronts," she said.

Of the record 1029 locally acquired cases reported across the state on Wednesday, 35 were in the Western NSW Local Health District, bringing the total number of cases there to 389.

There were 71 cases in the Nepean Blue Mountains district, six in the Far West, two in Illawarra Shoalhaven, and two on the Central Coast.

There were no new cases in the Hunter New England district.

NSW Health's ongoing sewage surveillance program has recently detected fragments of the virus at the sewage treatment plants in Tamworth, Merimbula, Cooma and Brewarrina.

Authorities are concerned because there are no known cases in these areas.

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All children aged 12 to 15 will be vaccinated against coronavirus with plans underway to expand the rollout.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison said cabinet's national security committee would consider how to widen the program on Thursday.

"Twelve to 15-year-olds in Australia will be vaccinated," he told reporters in Canberra.

Mr Morrison said the decision was consistent with interim advice from the expert immunisation panel ATAGI, which will deliver its final findings on Friday.

"That will enable us to move forward with the vaccination of 12- to 15-year-olds," he said.

There are 1.2 million people aged 12 to 15 in Australia.

About 220,000 children in that cohort with compromised immune systems, underlying health conditions or who are Indigenous are already eligible for the Pfizer jab.

There is no country that has approved coronavirus vaccines for children under 12.

Mr Morrison said with 1.8 million doses being administered a week, 12- to 15-year-olds could be immunised quickly.

The prime minister is confident there will be adequate supply of vaccines to expand the rollout which has been hampered by the pace of imports.

Australia continues to smash records for new coronavirus cases, which on Thursday exceeded 1100 in one day for the first time during the pandemic.

NSW reported 1029 new infections and three more deaths taking the national toll to 989.

Despite the surging caseload, the state government will allow five fully vaccinated people who are not in virus hot spots to gather outdoors from September 13.

Victoria had 80 new local cases with a stubborn outbreak continuing to circulate in Melbourne and the regional centre of Shepparton.

Some experts have raised concerns about the lingering effects of the virus on children.

Australian Medical Association president Omar Khorshid said parents should not panic about children being exposed to the disease.

"We don't need to be terrified about the thought that our children might get COVID," he told the ABC.

"They're more robust than we are, they're going to get through it more likely than we are."

Dr Khorshid said data from the United States on vaccinating children under 12 was not expected until September to October.

Australia has fully vaccinated 31.56 per cent of its population aged 16 and 54.37 per cent have received one jab.

Mr Morrison said he has not received advice that people under 16 should be included in vaccination statistics which are key to a national reopening plan.

© AAP 2021