Victoria COVID as it happened: State records only two new local cases as exposure site list swells to over 300

Associate Professor O’Brien also revealed that subsequent swift action from contact tracers could have averted the cluster spiralling into a major outbreak, as the team being led out of the Austin Hospital managed to contact five rings of potential transmission within just 60 hours.

He said by the time they were aware of the first case at Stratton Finance, there were already another dozen COVID-positive people out in the community.

“If we hadn’t had that speed to get to that so quickly those 12 people could have really led to a major outbreak, a super-spreading event,” he said.

“I think we need a fresh pair of eyes,” he said.

“I think he is needlessly looking at this from a very negative perspective. And I think that ... having a more objective and balanced approach might be in the state’s best interest.“

Professor Sutton has lauded the state’s contact tracing team in the past week.

Mr Smith also took aim at what he called a “systemic failure in our hotel quarantine” and contact tracing teams.

Mr Smith pointed to the fact that a man used a nebuliser in February which spawned a 5-day lockdown and reports in The Australian that dirty linen from quarantine guests were being stored in carparks used by city residents as evidence of failures in the quarantine system.

Controls have been tightened on the use of sleep apnoea machines and nebulisers since the February outbreak, and the government today said the presence of the linen was not considered high risk.

Mr Smith conceded he did not have intimate knowledge of the system but said issues were clear to outsiders.

“You’re asking me to put myself into the heart of the system that I’ve never been into,” he told host Raf Epstein.

“But clearly, compared with other states, compared with NSW, it’s processed four times the number of return travellers as Victoria yet they haven’t had a second or third or fourth lockdown like we’ve had.”

Ms Cassar said all twelve residents from the hotel had been asked to submit their serology testing so authorities can understand if any of them were exposed within the hotel.

“We should know more tomorrow,” she said.

“He would have had a very low level of infection at that point, but again there’s a negative pressured room,” she said.

The staff member in the hallway, who was wearing an N95 mask and face shield, has since tested negative.

Ms Cassar recounted a number of left-of-field lines of inquiry health authorities had checked to try find out how the transmission to the community happened, but nothing was confirmed yet.

One of the leads was staff within the hotel quarantine system who have since quit and therefor are no longer undergoing routine testing.

“So we’ve had four staff leave during this period, two were CQV staff who had testing beyond the 30th of May, so they’re out of that high-risk period,” she explained.

She said the other two staff members were hotel workers.

“One got on a plane and he’s now in Dubai, and one had fulfilled their last shift on the 29th or 30th of May,” she said.

“The last 24 hours it’s been a flurry of activity to really run the high-risk areas, and make sure that we’ve covered off on all of the bases.”

A tier-3 location is considered lower risk and people who attended the venue at the listed time should monitor for symptoms and isolate until they test negative for COVID-19 if they do develop.

There’s was some confusion about who exactly attended the convention centre on Monday, whether it was a positive case or a close contact. COVID-19 testing commander Jeroen Weimar has since clarified that it was in fact someone infected with the virus, who went there after being tested.

“One positive case had a brief visit to the vaccination centre at Jeff’s Shed yesterday afternoon,” he said.

“They completed their test and they went off and got - tried to get - a vaccination.

“They were advised to go back to isolation. We have two primary close contacts at the exhibition site now who dealt with the individual. It is a tier 3 PPE environment. It is well controlled. We’re confident there is no wider risk to the public but out of caution, we have listed it as a tier 3 site,” Mr Weimar said.

“For anybody who is a primary close contact or anybody who is a positive case, you must get tested, isolate and you cannot go to a vaccination centre. Vaccination centres are for people who are healthy, fit and eligible to get a vaccine.”