Sydney, 19 August 2021 (dpa/MIA) - A new record of daily Covid-19 infections in Australia was set on Thursday as the state of New South Wales reported 681 new cases. NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian said that one man in his 80s died, bringing the number of lives lost in connection to the virus in the state to 117 since the beginning of the pandemic. With 57 new locally transmitted cases in Victoria, and 16 in the Australian Capital Territory (ACT), home to the capital Canberra, there were at least 754 local infections nationwide reported on Thursday, a number that eclipsed the record set during last year's second wave. Victoria's Premier Daniel Andrews said that, while the 57 cases in the state were more than double those recorded a day earlier, 44 of those have been in isolation for their infectious period "I know 57 seems like a very big number," Andrews told reporters. "But when the vast majority of those have been in isolation for their infectious period, that's exactly what we want. That is the system working exactly as it should work." No other locally transmitted cases were initially reported in the rest of the country. A snap lockdown in the Northern Territory's city of Darwin, implemented earlier in the week after a US defence contractor infected with Covid-19 spent a number of days in the community, was due to be lifted as planned on Thursday after no new linked infections were found, Chief Minister Michael Gunner said. The town of Katherine, some 310 kilometres south-east of Darwin, will remain in lockdown for at least a further 24 hours. In New South Wales, Berejiklian said that a lockdown recently put in place in regional areas would be extended to align with Greater Sydney's lockdown, which has been in place for over seven weeks, and will last until at least August 28. The premier also said that a record 110,000 people got the jab on Wednesday, calling it a "phenomenal outcome" as 53 per cent of the state's residents got at least one dose and 28 per cent were fully vaccinated. Australia, with its 25 million inhabitants, was very successful in the fight against the pandemic for a long time because of extremely strict measures, including by keeping its international border closed with few exceptions since March 2020. However, a large proportion of the population is back in lockdown due to the spread of the Delta variant and a slow roll-out of vaccinations. So far, about 27.5 per cent of Australians over the age of 16 are fully vaccinated, and almost half of over-16s have had at least one jab. Over 40,700 cases have been confirmed nationwide, and some 970 people have died in connection with Covid-19.