Coronavirus Qld: Surge plan initiated amid flood of tests

A coronavirus testing surge plan has been initiated, with three more Gold Coast fever clinics and double the testing staff.

Queensland Health has opened three more Gold Coast fever clinics and doubled staff numbers at other public centres in the region to cope with huge queues of travellers getting tested for coronavirus.

The measure comes as the state recorded five new cases of COVID-19 in hotel quarantine, prompting Chief Health Officer Jeannette Young to warn about the escalating risk of the virus from overseas hot spots.

Despite outbreaks in Victoria and NSW, Queensland borders remain open to all of Australia except greater Sydney, with Dr Young closely monitoring the situation.

She said the Melbourne cases had been linked to known infections, allowing the Queensland border to remain open to Victorians – for now.

Drive-through testing at a COVID-19 clinic in Brisbane’s Bowen Hills. Picture: Josh Woning/NCA NewsWire

Meanwhile, Victoria is calling for an urgent meeting of National Cabinet over the threat of the UK’s mutant COVID-19 strain, amid fears it could devastate Australia, and the state wants to again push for pre-flight testing of anyone travelling from there.

Waits of up to seven hours have been reported at some Queensland COVID-19 testing clinics since a plea for anyone who had been in Victoria on or since December 21 to get tested and to quarantine until they receive a negative result.

Queues have been particularly long on the Gold Coast, where Victorians have been holidaying in large numbers.

Acting Premier Cameron Dick said Queensland Health was operating 83 fever clinics across the state since more were opened in Brisbane and on the Gold and Sunshine coasts to cope with a blowout in wait times at some facilities.

Dr Young said staff numbers at Gold Coast testing clinics had been doubled.

Private-sector testing facilities have also come back online after the Christmas-new year break.

“Normally, more than half of our testing in Queensland is done in the private sector,” Dr Young said.

Queensland’s hospital and health services had been put on notice before the break to prepare for an increase in testing and all had “surge” plans in place, Dr Young said.

“There were a few clinics that had extensive waits but there were other clinics that had no waits,” she said.

Despite the chaos at some fever clinics at the weekend, Mr Dick urged people to continue to come forward for testing.

“Complacency is the enemy and vigilance is our friend,” he said.

“This virus is a wicked thing as we’re seeing in places like the United States and the United Kingdom.”

Queensland has had 18 new cases of COVID-19 in the past week, all acquired overseas.

“We can see that the risk from overseas is continuing to escalate,” Dr Young said. “We have to be very, very careful with our hotel quarantine.

“We’ve now seen breaches in many of the other states and in New Zealand and elsewhere.”