Australian man brutally beats a policewoman as she tries to move him on while enforcing Sydney's draconian lockdown that only allows people to leave home with a 'reasonable excuse'

 This is the moment an Australia man brutally beat a female police officer in Sydney while she was enforcing the city's strict lockdown rules. 

The man launched his attack in the suburb of Bankstown around midday Monday after the officers saw him standing in the street and asked him to move along. 

Video shows one officer being repeatedly kicked and punched, while her colleague calls for help having also been beaten moments earlier. 

Sydney is now entering its 12th week under draconian lockdown rules which ban people from leaving home without a 'reasonable excuse' and mean they cannot loiter in public places to combat an outbreak of the Delta Covid variant.

The tough measures were designed to eliminate all cases as part of a so-called 'zero Covid' strategy, but state leaders have been forced to abandon that approach after infections proved all-but impossible to eradicate.

Instead, the road-map to freedom is now based on the number of adults who have been fully vaccinated - with the first major easing coming when 70 per cent are fully jabbed, and the second easing at 80 per cent.

Currently, around 46 per cent of adults are fully vaccinated. If jabs continue at their current pace, lockdown should start to ease around the middle of October.  

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A man was caught on camera brutally beating a female police officer in western Sydney on Monday after cops confronted him for breaking lockdown rules 

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The attack began when the officers asked the man to 'move along' because he was standing in the street, which is not permitted under the city's harsh laws 

Sydney's ultra-strict lockdown rules 

Sydney is now entering its 12th week of strict lockdown, meaning that...

• Everyone is banned from leaving their homes except for 'essential reasons', such as to buy food, attend medical appointments, or to do essential business
• Those leaving home even for essential reasons must stay within their local areas and carry proof of address - though essential workers may travel further to reach their place of work
• Face masks are mandatory in all public places - both indoor and outdoor - unless people are eating, drinking or exercising
• Exercise is only permitted in groups of up to two people - unless people are exercising with members of their own household or are fully vaccinated, when the limit rises to five
• Fully vaccinated people may also meet outdoors to socialise in groups of up to five, but are required to carry proof of their vaccine status and provide it to a police officer upon request
• Offices, schools and most shops are closed - with restaurants and retailers only able to offer delivery or click and collect services
• Shops which are allowed to open - such as supermarkets and pharmacies - must comply with strict social distancing guidelines and capacity limits
• Weddings are allowed to take place with capacity limits of five people, including the minister or registrar
• Funerals can take place with up to 10 attendees, not including the overseeing official

After the 70 per cent target has been reached, pubs, shops, gyms, and restaurants will be allowed to reopen - though only for those with full vaccine protection and with social distancing and mask-wearing rules in place.

Outdoor gatherings will be limited to 20 people, though ticketed events will be allowed up to a maximum of 5,000 people provided social distancing can be maintained. 

Just six people will be allowed to gather indoors, though that rises to 50 people at weddings and funerals.

Restrictions will then be further eased once the 80 per cent target has been reached, though ministers have not yet said exactly what rules will change. 

Some measures also eased in the state starting from today, with groups of up to five double-jabbed people allowed to meet in public.  

Areas of New South Wales which have recorded zero Covid cases have also been allowed to reopen shops and other businesses. 

Police said a 43-year-old man has since been arrested on suspicion of attacking the two officers. 

Cops said he then attack a third male officer after being taken into custody.  

The male officer and the two female officers - all had to be taken to hospital for treatment.

'Charges are expected to be laid and inquiries into the incident are continuing,' NSW Police said. 

Sydney is now entering its 12th week in strict lockdown measures after Australia's 'zero Covid' strategy failed to eradicate cases of the highly-infectious Delta variant.

New South Wales Premier Gladys Berejiklian has now all-but abandoned the strategy, and is instead linking the end of lockdown restrictions with the number of fully vaccinated people rather than the number of cases.

She has promised the state's 8million residents that measures will begin easing when 70 per cent of people are fully vaccinated, a target that is expected to be hit in the middle of next month.

Around 46 per cent of eligible adults have so-far been fully jabbed. 

But, Ms Berejiklian has warned, those who are not fully protected should not expect to be granted the same freedoms as those who are.   

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Australia is in the midst of its biggest wave of infections so far after its 'zero Covid' strategy failed to contain outbreaks of the highly-infectious Delta variant

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Covid deaths have also been steadily rising, with ministers now linking the end of lockdown restrictions to the number of fully-vaccinated adults

New Zealand locks down Auckland for ANOTHER week 

New Zealand has extended its Covid lockdown as the country tries to stamp out cases of the Delta variant.

The capital Auckland will spend at least another week in the strictest restrictions after 33 Delta cases there on Monday, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said, marking its longest shut-down of the pandemic so far.

Meanwhile the rest of the country will remain in Level 2 restrictions - meaning mandatory mask-wearing and social distancing measures - until at least Monday, despite recording zero cases.

Ms Ardern said the country's strict 'zero Covid' strategy - with harsh lockdowns used even for a handful of cases - had helped bring the latest outbreak under control but that 'we haven't quite finished the job yet'.

She admitted there 'is not widespread transmission of the virus in Auckland' but said a handful of cases not linked to any known outbreaks are causing concern, because it means not all cases have been discovered yet.

Most New Zealanders remain vulnerable to infection, because the country has fully vaccinated just a third of its population

'For those of you who choose not to be vaccinated, that is your choice, but don't expect to do everything that vaccinated people do,' she said.

'Our vaccination rates keep increasing, however there has been a slight slowdown. So we encourage everybody to come forward and get vaccinated.'

Some curbs were eased for fully vaccinated residents in Sydney from Monday. Five people will be allowed to meet outside while members from the same family in Sydney's 12 hardest-hit suburbs can gather outside for two hours.

Australia is scrambling to control outbreaks of the highly infectious Delta variant of the novel coronavirus that began in Sydney in June and spread to Melbourne and Canberra, plunging nearly half the population of 25 million into lockdown. 

Other state capitals, however, have few or zero cases.

The steady rise in infections has turned up the heat on the federal government to procure emergency vaccine supplies. 

An additional 1 million doses of Moderna was bought from the European Union on Sunday while vaccine swap deals with Britain and Singapore were executed over the last two weeks.

Lieutenant General John Frewen, head of the federal government's vaccination taskforce, said there would be enough vaccines from the middle of October to fully inoculate every eligible person. 

The COVID-19 vaccination drive was expanded on Monday to include around one million children aged 12-15.

Australian biotech company CSL, which locally produces the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine, said a positive case was detected at its Melbourne facility but production would not be interrupted.

Australia's total cases stand at around 75,300, including 1,098 deaths, although the mortality rate in the latest outbreak is lower than last year.

A total of 1,257 new cases were registered in New South Wales on Monday, while neighbouring Victoria reported 473 new infections, its biggest one-day rise for 2021.

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Some lockdown rules in Sydney were eased from Monday, with small groups of fully-jabbed people allowed to meet in public in low-risk areas