Queensland BAFFLED over how mystery coronavirus cluster began in Brisbane as another two people test positive including a prison officer – plunging 7000 inmates into lockdown
- Queensland Corrective Services Academy officer tested positive on Wednesday
- The prison trainer worked with officers who have been deployed to other prisons
- Prisons across the state's southeast are in lockdown - 7000 inmates in isolation
- It is the state's second case in the last 24 hours, with another in hotel quarantine
- The case takes a growing cluster to 12, as authorities try to connect it to another
- An earlier cluster emerged last month after two infected women visited from VIC
Queensland health officials are still battling to find the link between two growing coronavirus clusters, as an officer working at a prison training academy tests positive.
Queensland Corrective Services Academy said the prisoner trainer worked on Friday before returning a positive result on Wednesday.
The officer had been in contact with other trainees who have since been deployed to other prisons, plunging 7000 inmates across the state into lockdown.
'All correctional facilities in Queensland will remain on full lockdown this morning to allow for briefings and further advice from Queensland Health,' a QCS spokesperson said in a statement.
The new case has sparked fears of further community-transmission as it takes a growing cluster in the state's southeast to 12 .
Queensland Chief Health Officer Dr Jeannette Young (pictured) said authorities are trying to connect a cluster in the state's southeast with an earlier one that emerged last month
Twenty-five close contacts of the prison trainer - 14 recruits and 11 colleagues - have been identified, tested and quarantined.
Deputy Premier and Health Minister Steven Miles said the worker trained correctional officers, but did not work in prisons.
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Stage four restrictions have been enacted in prisons stretching from Capricornia to the southeast, with all prisoners secured in their cells and movement within the facilities restricted.
Only those who develop symptoms or who have come into contact with the prison trainer will be tested.
The latest case brings a cluster in the state's southeast to 12, which has been linked to the Brisbane Youth Detention Centre at Wacol (pictured)
Everyone on the premises will be required to wear masks and personal visitations have temporarily ceased.
Investigations are now under way as to how the latest case was contracted.
Chief Health Officer Jeannette Young said the man lived at Forest Lake, in Brisbane's south west, where a number of venues have been subject to a public health alert.
A single new case identified on Wednesday - a close contact of another known case- also resides in Forrest Lake.
A cluster in the region emerged last week linked to the Brisbane Youth Detention Centre at Wacol.
More than 85 locations have been added to a list of places visited by infected individuals in the area, including the Forest Lake Tavern and Richlands Magistrates Courthouse.
Authorities hope further testing this week will connect the cluster to an earlier outbreak sparked by two infected women who snuck across the border from Melbourne last month.
The new case is the second to be recorded in Queensland in the past 24 hours, along with a person in hotel quarantine.
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