Premier defends infected hotel quarantine worker as state records seven new cases
NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian says it is a miracle that only one security guard involved in hotel quarantine in the state had contracted COVID-19 and says there is nothing to indicate the worker has done anything wrong.
The security guard, who is believed to have caught the virus from a US returned traveller in hotel quarantine, had also worked shifts at Parramatta Local Court and Flemington Market, prompting alerts for those locations.
Ms Berejiklian said hotel quarantine in NSW had processed more than 47,000 people during the pandemic without any guard being infected.
The Premier also defended the guard's decision to work at different jobs, and stressed he had done nothing wrong.
"We have to accept that there are jobs now in the community that are higher risk, and that's a reality," Ms Berejiklian said.
"But you also can't say to somebody if you work in a particular environment you can't go to a restaurant [or] you can't go shopping ... that's why the message to everybody is: no matter where you work, no matter what you do, if you have a symptom get tested."
NSW recorded seven new coronavirus cases overnight, after conducting almost 20,000 tests. Ms Berejiklian also offered a glimmer of hope to for year 12 students, saying it is possible graduation ceremonies and other celebrations will be allowed once students have completed their HSC exams.
Ms Berejiklian repeated her call for people in western and south-west Sydney to come forward for testing amid fears of community transmission in the area, saying "NSW is doing OK but we need all of us to be vigilant".
Two of the cases were in hotel quarantine.
The remaining five cases were locally acquired: one is a south-west Sydney person who is a close contact of a previously reported case which is currently under investigation. A separate case is a person in south-west Sydney whose case is also currently under investigation and another case is a household contact of this person. The remaining two cases are a person from western Sydney and a household contact, the source of whose infections are also under investigation.
This week, NSW Health announced new policies for the state's government schools, which placed a ban on graduation ceremonies with parents present.
Ms Berejiklian said this could be reviewed once the HSC exams had been completed.
"The policies we've put in place around those events, is to make sure that there's as little disruption to the HSC as possible," Ms Berejiklian said, adding that "the last thing" she wanted was for schools to be shut due to cases while students were completing their year 12 final exams.
"But coming back into term once the HSC is finished, there will be an opportunity for Health to consider our schools having those ceremonies."