NSW coronavirus cases: Penrith, Nepean Sydney’s new hot spot
An Aspen Medical worker has been stood down for breaching infection controls at Newmarch House nursing home where a 16th resident has died of coronavirus. It comes as Sydney’s COVID-19 ground zero moved 60km west from Bondi to the foot of the mountains.
NSW
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Forget Bondi, Sydney’s coronavirus ground zero has moved 60km west to the foot of the Blue Mountains.
Despite being on the NSW Health priority testing list for a month, Penrith and the Nepean area are continuing to record new outbreaks of COVID-19.
NSW chief medical officer Dr Kerry Chant said there had been four new cases at the Newmarch House nursing home in the suburb of Caddens since yesterday.
The facility is now the site of the country’s most devastating outbreak since the Ruby Princess, with 16 deaths and 66 confirmed cases of infection among staff and residents.
Yesterday Dr Chant said the strain of coronavirus sweeping through Newmarch House had also been detected in the wider community nearby.
“This strain is basically the strain that was in that sort of broader Penrith area,” Ms Chant said.
The virus has spread among a number of communities in the surrounding suburbs.
Yesterday a seven-year-old boy who attended Warragamba Public School tested positive and the school was closed for emergency cleaning.
Dr Chant also announced today a worker at the Nepean Blue Mountains Local Health District had also tested positive yesterday but had not worked while infectious.
That was in addition to a Nepean Hospital worker who was announced as positive on April 26. The woman had also worked at the Sydney Adventist Hospital in Wahroonga.
“Blue Mountains and that Penrith area (have been) on our increased testing advocacy for quite a while and that’s because we had seen locally acquired cases pop up there,” she said.
In Mulgoa just south of Penrith, three members of a Christian Brothers community contracted coronavirus after one returned from a conference in Peru.
The Penrith council area alone has the fourth highest number of cases, standing at 119, behind Northern Beaches, Sydney and Waverley.
There have been 25 cases in the neighbouring Blue Mountains council area.
It comes as a worker for the federal government contractor Aspen Medical has been stood down for breaching infection controls at Newmarch House.
The home’s operator Anglicare confirmed in a statement it had asked Aspen Medical to stand down the care worker because they incorrectly used Personal Protection Equipment.
“The reason why the person was stood down was for breaches of the PPE protocol. We take our PPE protocols seriously. It’s vital to protect those we’re caring for from this terrible virus,” the statement said.
However the private contractor hit back this afternoon, saying they were still waiting for critical information on the incident from Anglicare more than a day after the worker was stood down.
“We are still waiting on a detailed incident report from Anglicare in relation to a member of our surge support agency staff who was stood down yesterday morning. Once we have the facts, we will investigate the matter thoroughly and provide our staff member with a fair and balanced hearing. We continue to support the residents of Newmarch House with a team of 35 healthcare professionals on a roster reporting to the facility management team,” the statement said.
“Aspen Medical was asked to provide surge staff to support to Anglicare during this outbreak of COVID-19 at Newmarch House with effect from 20 April 2020.”
Federal aged care minister Richard Colbeck sent Aspen Medical into the facility last month to help backfill some of the 75 per cent of the normal workforce who were in isolation.
Anglicare also announced this afternoon a 16th resident who had tested positive to COVID-19 had died.