New South Wales, Australia's most populous state, has reported 210 locally acquired cases of Covid-19, as police cordoned off downtown Sydney with multiple checkpoints to prevent a planned anti-lockdown protest.

Sydney and its vicinities have been under a weeks-long strict lockdown that is to last at least until the end of August while battling an outbreak of the highly infectious Delta variant. Today's numbers bring the outbreak to 3,190 cases, according to a Reuters report.

About 1,000 police officers have been deployed around Sydney to prevent an unauthorised demonstration against the lockdown and the police have been issuing prohibition notices to taxi and rideshare services banning them from taking passengers to demonstrations, the NSW police said.