Queensland records no new Covid-19 cases but latest case ‘spread in hotel quarantine’
The transmission of Covid-19 from one floor of a Queensland hotel to another would be a “world first”, Australia’s chief medical officer says, revealing how he believes the state’s latest case could have happened.
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A woman who spent four hours out and about in Brisbane at the weekend while unknowingly infectious with Covid-19, caught it while in hotel quarantine, with Australia’s chief medical officer saying the nature of the transmission would be a “world first”.
Queensland’s Chief Health Officer Jeannette Young said genomic sequencing had linked the woman’s case to another flight crew member who was staying at the same quarantine hotel, but on a different floor.
Both were infected with the Alpha variant of SARS-CoV-2, the virus which causes Covid-19, and were in quarantine at Brisbane’s Four Points Hotel.
Urgent investigations are under way into how the Portuguese woman, who flew into Brisbane on an Emirates flight from Portugal, via Dubai, on June 5, was able to catch the virus while staying on a different floor of the hotel to the other positive case.
“There is no doubt that she has acquired it in the hotel, or at some point when she’s come into contact with that person,” Dr Young said.
“They were on a totally different flight into Australia.
“They were on different floors... They’re all the things we are looking at to see where crossover could have occurred.”
Australia’s chief medical officer says the spread from one floor to another would be a “world first”.
Chief medical officer Prof Paul Kelly, speaking after National cabinet, theorised that Queensland’s latest case of Covid-19 was most likely caught from hotel staff.
“It is unusual… the other hotel quarantine transmissions we’ve seen have been very close rooms and on the same floor, however it would be said that there are staff that move from floor to floor and if I was a betting man, I would suggested that it has something to do with staff movement but that’s really a matter of for Queensland to investigate,” he said.
Prof Kelly said the transmission of the virus “from a quite high floor to a relatively low floor would be a world first”.
She said Four Points Hotel employees were being re-tested but she was “confident” the virus had not spread from one floor to another through a staff member.
“We know that our staff get tested every single shift, but we’re absolutely confirming all of that,” Dr Young said.
The woman tested negative three times in hotel quarantine, including on day 12.
She completed 14 days’ quarantine at 9am Saturday and tested positive at 7.50pm that night after undergoing further testing as part of protocols requiring flight crew to be tested every seven days.
“It was a routine test that picked it up on that day, which is why we’ve been able to get onto this so quickly,” Dr Young said.
The woman spent most of Saturday at apartments in Hamilton, on Brisbane’s northside, but was at the airport DFO from 4-4.30pm, where she spent time in the Cotton On store.
Dr Young has asked people who were at DFO at that time to self-isolate and contact Queensland Health so that contact tracers could assess their risk of catching the virus.
The woman was in the Brisbane CBD window shopping between 5-6pm at the same time as “some sort of scavenger hunt”.
“It was actually quite crowded in the CBD on Saturday afternoon – so anyone who has been in the CBD on that Saturday - late afternoon, early evening, any symptoms at all, please come forward and get tested immediately,” Dr Young said.
Queensland Health notified the woman of her positive test at 7.50pm on Saturday while she was dining at the Portuguese Family Centre restaurant at Ellen Grove, on Brisbane’s southwestern outskirts. She went immediately to hospital on learning of her test result.
Dr Young said five more people had tested positive to the pandemic virus in Queensland in the past 24 hours, all of them detected in hotel quarantine.
Queensland still has 32 active cases of the virus.
Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk on Monday said the latest figures were “really good news”.
The woman diagnosed over the weekend attended Brisbane Airport DFO between 4pm-4.30pm on Saturday afternoon, was in Brisbane City between 5pm and 6pm, and at the Portuguese Family Centre at Ellen Grove between 7pm to 7.50pm.
Anyone who was at any of those venues during those times needs to immediately isolate themselves.
On Sunday, Ms Palaszczuk announced more restrictions would ease from 1am on Friday, including the return of self-serve buffets and smorgasbords, and indoor capacity increasing by 50 per cent.
More than 80,000 vaccinations were administered last week in Queensland.
There were five cases detected in hotel quarantine on Monday. There are 32 active cases in the state.
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