As residents in Greater Sydney enter their sixth week of lockdown, there is an increased push by federal health authorities to vaccinate the city back into freedom

The highly contagious Delta variant is continuing to spread rapidly through the city.

Premier Gladys Berejiklian is urging people to come forward and roll up their sleeves.

She says that the vaccines are effective against this particular Covid strain.

Highlighting that the jab is keeping people out of hospital and also reducing transmission rates.

The premier believes that once you start seeing 50 percent and above of the population fully vaccinated, this is when you can start to trigger more freedoms.

It comes as federal officials become increasingly optimistic that vaccination rates in New South Wales could reach 70 percent in just five weeks.

This could essentially bring the lockdown to an end.

However, with just 450,000 doses currently being administered each week, the state will need to significantly ramp up its vaccination efforts to meet this ambitious September target.