NSW records 23rd day of zero local cases, investigation into positive traveller continues
NSW recorded no new locally acquired cases for the 23rd day in a row, assuming an overseas traveller who tested positive two days after leaving quarantine is found to have caught the virus overseas.
Two cases were reported in overseas travellers in the 24 hours to 8pm on Monday to bring the total number of cases in NSW to 4936.
Medical officers at a drive-through COVID-19 testing clinic at Auburn last month.Credit:Steven Saphore
NSW’s Deputy Chief Health Officer Dr Jeremy McAnulty said extensive investigations were ongoing into the source of the infection of a returned traveller who flew into Sydney from South America.
The individual from Wollongong tested positive for the COVID-19 virus two days after being released from mandatory 14-day hotel quarantine and was reported in Monday’s case numbers.
Genomic sequencing has begun to determine whether the person has one of the more contagious variants first detected in the UK, South Africa and Brazil.
There were 7315 tests reported over the same 24-hour period, compared to 11,399 the previous day.
Forty-two people are being treated for COVID-19 by NSW Health, none of whom are in intensive care.
They had returned two negative results while in quarantine, before testing positive under NSW Health’s new 16-day regimen.
In Victoria, genomic sequencing confirmed the latest Melbourne hotel quarantine worker to contract COVID-19 has the UK variant of the virus.
The woman’s case is the third quarantine leak in the past fortnight confirmed to be the more infectious British variant of COVID-19. Two other recent infections – one in a 26-year-old Grand Hyatt worker and another in a returned traveller at the Park Royal – prompted the Andrews government to tighten hotel quarantine rules last week.
The Victorian government will now pay staff to get tested on their days off. Previously, staff were only tested on their workdays.
The state recorded no new cases of COVID-19 in the community or in quarantine hotels on Tuesday.
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Kate Aubusson is Health Editor of The Sydney Morning Herald.