Health Minister Steven Miles and Chief Health Officer Dr Jeannette Young provide an update on COVID-19

Queensland has recorded two new cases of Covid 19 overnight – a college student and a nurse at Ipswich Hospital. There are now more than 200 staff from the hospital in quarantine, putting it under “pressure”.

Queensland has recorded two new cases of COVID-19 overnight.

The first case is a sibling of an infected student at Staines Memorial College, with the second case being a nurse at Ipswich Hospital.

There are now more than 220 staff members from the hospital in quarantine.

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Deputy Premier and Health Minister Steven Miles and Queensland’s Chief Health Officer Dr Jeannette Young provided the update this morning, when it was announced paramedics will now perform tests.

Queensland Ambulance Service will train 50 paramedics who will be able to quickly test for COVID following a community breakout.

The team will be able to establish pop-up fever clinics in car parks or other locations to make testing more convenient.

Dr Young said 222 staff at Ipswich Hospital were in quarantine and admitted it was under some “pressure”.

She said there was no concern about how the latest case, a 32-year old nurse, who contracted COVID-19 even though she’s been in contact with staff in the hospital’s paediatric wards.

Adding the 32-year-old’s health and safety precautions have “been excellent”.

It’s not inevitable the state will be forced into another lockdown like Melbourne but Dr Young mentioned determining COVID-19 hotspots is a “difficult process”.

“There’s a risk (of another lockdown)... but we’re working towards that so it won’t happen,” Young said.

“The hotspots that we’re looking at today are totally different to the ones we were looking at in March ... it’s a difficult process.”

It is understood the nurse was infected while treating another infected patient.

The second case, the sister of a Staines Memorial College student already infected, was in isolation.

It comes after NSW recorded 10 new cases and Victoria recorded 63 new cases and five deaths.

Dr Young said Queensland was doing all it could to help NSW and Victoria limit its community transmission and help Australia open by Christmas.

“It would be fantastic,” she said.

There are now 25 active cases in Queensland of COVID-19. There have been 1131 confirmed cases since the pandemic started.