There have been another three cases of COVID 19 detected in Victoria this evening.
Key points:
- Bacchus Marsh Grammar has closed after a teacher tested positive to COVID-19
- Thousands of the school’s students have been sent homeÂ
- The MCG has been listed as an exposure site after an infected person attended the Carlton-Geelong game on July 10
One of the new cases is a teacher at Bacchus Marsh Grammar school, west of Melbourne.
The other two cases are family members of the teacher.
This brings the total number of cases reported in Victoria today to 11. The school teacher and his family were added to the seven reported during the day and one other case reported earlier in the morning.
The school has been closed for deep cleaning and thousands of students have been sent home.
The school says the teacher attended a staff development day on Monday at its Maddingley campus in Bacchus Marsh but was not at school on Tuesday or today when students returned to class.
Most of the new cases have been linked to the removalists who, it has now been confirmed, breached freight conditions by not wearing masks while visiting the Ariele apartment complex in Maribyrnong on July 8.
More than 130 people who live in the Ariele complex have been told their 14-day quarantine period, which they began yesterday, has been extended because of the new cases.
Cases linked to that chain of transmission are:
- A man in his 60s who lives at the Ariele apartment complex
- The man’s 89 and 90-year-old parents who live in Craigieburn
- Three members of the same household who live in the Ariele apartment complex
- The Bacchus Marsh teacher and two members of his family
The AFL game between Carlton and Geelong at the MCG on July 10 has been listed as an exposure site.
A Bacchus Marsh secondary school will close for at least the rest of the week after a teacher tested positive to Covid-19(Supplied
)
Senior Victorian ministers and public health officials are currently holding meetings to discuss the emerging outbreak and what restrictions may need to be reintroduced.
No announcements are expected tonight, and officials are buoyed by the fact they have been able to determine the source of all new cases.
Victoria’s COVID-19 response commander Jeroen Weimar said the man in his 60s from the Ariele apartments sat in Level 2 of the MCC Reserve, and 2,000 people were being contacted and told to isolate and get tested.
“This is clearly a very rapidly moving situation, and we are very keen to make sure we get a very firm grip on this as soon as we possibly can,” he said.
The man also visited Highpoint shopping centre on July 9, and the shopping centre has been listed a COVID-19 exposure site.
Catch up on the main COVID-19 news from July 14 with a look back at our blog.
The second chain of transmission is linked to a Craigieburn family who recently returned from a New South Wales red zone.
The seventh new case is a man in his 30s who was contacted after visiting a Coles supermarket at Craigieburn Central shopping centre, and checking in via the QR code system.
The supermarket had been identified as an exposure site after being visited by one of the members of the Craigieburn family.
A Maribyrnong kindergarten has been confirmed as an exposure site but at this stage it has not been publicly listed.
There were 33,037Â test results received yesterday, and 14,989Â doses of vaccine were administered at state-run sites.
One infection was detected in hotel quarantine.
‘Exceptionally frustrated’ over removalists’ information
On Tuesday night, a service station and fast food outlet at Kalkallo on the Hume Highway, north of Melbourne, were added to the list of exposure sites.
See the full list of Victorian exposure sites
A service station and a Hungry Jack’s outlet at Kalkallo, on the Hume Highway, have been added to the list of exposure sites. Here’s the full list.
Read more
The removalists, who tested positive in New South Wales after returning from Victoria last week, stopped at the Caltex service station at Kalkallo and purchased food at the Hungry Jack’s outlet at the venue on July 8.
Mr Weimar said it had now been confirmed the removalists travelled to Victoria in two vehicles and the men were not forthcoming with information about their movements.
“Books will be thrown when it’s time, when it’s appropriate to throw them,” he said.Â
“I’m exceptionally frustrated at the pace and transparency of the information coming from the removalists’ exposure, that’s been a real matter of concern.”
All four of the positive cases discovered early this morning live on the building’s third floor, which is where the removalists were working.
The residents of the Ariele apartment building in Maribyrnong were lockded down because it was a tier one exposure site after removalists who were infected with COVID-19 worked in the building on July 8, 2021.(ABC News: Rudy De Santis
)
On Tuesday morning, the Maribyrnong residents woke to the news they would be under strict lockdown for two weeks given their exposure.
But due to the extra cases emerging at the Ariele Apartments, health officials have told residents that their quarantine period had been reset, so the 14-day period will begin again from today.
Geelong wastewater detections cause for concern
Detections of viral fragments in wastewater in two separate parts of Geelong have prompted health authorities to urge anyone in the area to ensure they get tested if they have any symptoms.
COVID-19 fragments were detected in a catchment covering the Geelong suburbs of Belmont, Highton and Wandana Heights between July 4 and July 7.
There was also a detection between July 8 and 12 in a catchment that covers the suburbs of Breakwater, Clifton Springs, Curlewis, Leopold, Drysdale, East Geelong, Moolap, Newcomb, South Geelong, Thomson and Whittington.
Authorities said the detections could be from an undiagnosed case or from someone who did have COVID-19 and was no longer infectious but continued to “shed” the virus.
People ‘kind of ‘ doing the right thing not good enough
Mr Weimar said he understood that the removalists had not been wearing masks while working in the Ariele apartment complex, breaching the conditions they were supposed to abide by.
A member of the Craigieburn family of four that entered Victoria under a red zone permit had gone to the supermarket.
Under a red zone permit, people are required to quarantine for 14 days.
He said all Victorians needed to take heed and ensure they were complying with rules, particularly given there were thousands of people quarantining at home who entered the state from red zone areas.
“This virus jumps at a very significant speed and these leaks can be very damaging,” he said.
“We’ve all got, collectively, a fair amount of cleaning up to do around both these chains of transmission, both of which would have been generated by people thinking they were kind of doing the right thing, but actually not.”
Changes to South Australia’s restrictions with Victoria
As of midnight on Wednesday, South Australian authorities require all people coming in from Victoria to undertake level 1 testing. That means you must have a test within 24 hours of arriving in South Australia and you are not permitted to go to a high-risk location, for example, an aged-care facility, until you have a negative result.
South Australia is also requiring all freight drivers who are arriving in South Australia to produce evidence of a negative COVID test that has been undertaken within the last 48 hours on arrival to the state. If you don’t have a negative result, you will be required to have a test within 24 hours after arriving in South Australia.
South Australian police also took the opportunity to encourage anyone who was at the AFL at the MCG to isolate and get a test and contact SA Health for further instructions. If you have been in Victoria over the last weekend, you are also encouraged to keep up to date with exposure sites emerging in Victoria and follow health advice if you have been to one of those sites.
What you need to know about coronavirus: