Covid-positive Carindale Mum and daughter send millions of people into one more day of lockdown

Contact tracers worked through the night with Queensland’s latest Covid-19 virus cases, a Brisbane woman and her daughter who had been “out and about extensively”.

A man on the Sunshine Coast has tested positive to coronavirus, making him the latest community acquired case in Queensland.

The man, aged in his 50s, returned a positive result on Friday after undertaking his Covid test on Thursday.

Officials are trying to determine how the man contracted the virus and what strain it is.

Queensland's Chief Health Officer Dr Jeannette Young during a press conference in Brisbane. Picture: NCA NewsWire/Tertius Pickard

Before the man tested positive, a woman and her daughter from Carindale in Brisbane’s southeast were Queensland’s latest mystery cases of the Covid-19 virus, sending millions of people into another 24 hours of lockdown.

Contact tracers worked through the night with the pair to identify exposure sites and to start tracking down close contacts.

Chief Health Officer Jeannette Young hopes to have genomic sequencing results later today on whether the cases are linked to any known clusters and if they have the highly contagious Delta variant.

If she cannot connect the infections to one of the state’s known outbreaks, it will mean Queensland is battling the virus on six separate fronts simultaneously, including cases linked to a Prince Charles Hospital receptionist, the NT Granites gold mine, a Qatar Airways check-in counter employee, a Virgin flight crew member and the Portuguese Family Centre restaurant.

Premier Annastacia Palaszcuk today announced an extension of the lockdown in Brisbane and Moreton Bay for 24 hours to 6pm Saturday to give contact tracers time to find contacts of the Mum and daughter and to help them deal with a new case linked to Brisbane’s international airport.

A baggage handler, who is the partner of the Qatar Airways worker, has also positive to the pandemic virus.

Dr Young described him as the “index case”, giving the Delta variant of the virus to his partner. The man is suspected to have been infected by international airline crew.

“It is not clustering with any known case in Queensland or Australia,” she said. “On the international database, it looks like it’s closest to some cases in India.”

Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk during a press conference in Brisbane. Picture: NCA NewsWire/Tertius Pickard

Dr Young said the luggage handler was believed to have recovered but “has had a lot of contact” with other people.

She said the Carindale mother and daughter had been out and about extensively in inner-city Brisbane and West End while unknowingly infectious with the virus.

Dr Young pleaded with people to stay in Brisbane City and Moreton Bay during the extended lockdown.

“Please don’t leave,” she said, adding she did not want the virus to spread “beyond where it currently is”.

She repeated calls for Queenslanders, no matter where they lived across the state, to get a Covid test if they developed symptoms.

“Don’t think: ‘Oh, I haven’t had any contact with someone who might be a case,” she said. “Just come forward and immediately get tested because we’ve got to find cases as quickly as we possibly can. It’s crucial.”