People with protective face masks walk through the quiet city centre during a lockdown to curb the spread of a coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak in Sydney, Australia, July 28, 2021.

SYDNEY, Aug 4 (Reuters) - Australia's New South Wales reported one of the country's youngest deaths from COVID-19 on Wednesday, as daily infections lingered near a 16-month high despite the lockdown of 5 million people in Sydney entering its sixth week.

It was unclear if the Sydney man had the Delta coronavirus variant but most of the latest cases in New South Wales have been that type.

The young man was one of two COVID-19 deaths reported in New South Wales in the past 24 hours.

New South Wales also recorded 233 new cases, near a 16-month high reported last week, and State Premier Gladys Berejiklian said case numbers would likely grow.

"I'm not going to rule out case numbers won’t get worse, I actually think they will get worse,” Berejiklian told reporters in Sydney, the New South Wales capital.