Fury as latest COVID-19 cases put Gold Coast at risk

Gold Coast doctors say they are already bracing for the worst as new outbreaks are confirmed in Queensland, while local leaders fume at those accused of dodging quarantine.

FUMING Gold Coast leaders urge returning travellers to be honest and want “the book thrown” at two teenagers fined $4000 after travelling to Melbourne and lying to authorities about where they’d been on re-entry to Queensland.

The 19-year-olds became the state’s first positive COVID-19 cases outside quarantine since May when Olivia Winnie Muranga – a cleaner at now-closed Parklands Christian College, Park Ridge – got a test on Monday after days of feeling ill. On Tuesday morning her travel companion Diana Lasu tested positive.

The pair were on Wednesday night fined $4000 for making false declarations on border paperwork, along with another travel companion, awaiting COVID-19 test results.

A third woman – the 22-year-old sister of one of the COVID-positive girls who did not travel to Melbourne – also tested positive, inadvertently forcing the closure of Chatswood Hills State School where she works at the PCYC.

Olivia Winnie Muranga.

Diana Lasu.

Authorities are bracing for a cluster as contact tracers continue to chart the paths of Muranga and Lasu through Logan and Brisbane.

The results of hundreds of tests on Wednesday across the region, including at a pop-up clinic at Parklands Christian College, are expected back today and will reveal if the virus has travelled.

Police have launched a criminal investigation into how the girls evaded Queensland’s strict border restrictions that require everyone to isolate at a hotel if they have been to COVID hotspots like Victoria.

Part of their investigation will be into how their flights were booked from Melbourne to Brisbane, with a short layover at Sydney airport, and whether they used fake names and contact details on their border declaration passes.

It’s understood Ms Muranga went to work at Parklands Christian College for two days before calling in sick on Friday and visiting the doctor on Saturday, when she was told to immediately get tested.

Burleigh Cove Respiratory Clinic registered nurse Angel Anderson in her PPE at the centre. Picture Glenn Hampson

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But she continued to socialise in Ipswich and Brisbane, going to dinner in Springfield on Sunday and a noodle restaurant and dessert and cocktail bar in Southbank on Monday, health authorities say.

Finally getting tested on Monday, it’s understood Ms Muranga was out in the community before her positive result came back on Tuesday.

Authorities have described it as a “perfect storm”, with a large number of public places visited and the girls living in households of up to 10.

Gold Coast health heads say the three confirmed COVID-19 cases in Logan will put the region’s response to the test, with many local doctors deeming the latest cases “inevitable”. Gold Coast Primary Health Network chairman Dr Roger Halliwell, who has warned of complacency among locals, said there was no indication the Gold Coast was at increased risk, at this stage.

“It doesn’t constitute a hot spot, but it is a chance to test drive systems in place. We anticipate we will get cases and will get hot spots, our job is to identify them and adapt as quickly as possible.

“We were saying anyone who had respiratory symptoms should be tested, now we are saying everyone who has symptoms should be tested.”

COVID signs are out up at the Parklands Christian College in Park Ridge. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Jono Searle

Mayor Tom Tate urged all returning travellers to be honest: “If you have been to Victoria or one of these clusters in Sydney just be honest and take the 14-day quarantine. It’s a minor thing compared to infecting the rest of Queensland. It’s 14 days of watching Netflix.”

Destination Gold Coast chairman Paul Donovan urged Ms Palaszczuk to boost penalties to a $50,000 fine and six months prison for anyone lying to health authorities.

“If it’s true what these ones are accused of doing, they should have the book thrown at them,” he said. “You don’t play with livelihoods and health.”

General Practitioners Gold Coast’s Katrina McLean said the infected girls would not be alone bypassing border rules.

“Unfortunately they are not the only ones acting like this. We still have a cohort who didn’t quarantine properly and likely others who have entered the state by deceptive means and who may well have put off testing,” Dr McLean said. “A positive, if there is one, is these women got tested.”

Premier Palaszczuk said: “I’m absolutely furious. These two have gone to Victoria, come back and given misleading information to authorities.

Chief Health Officer Jeannette Young was “very disappointed” in the “reckless” behaviour and implored people to get a test if they had any hint of symptoms.

“These two young women have been out in the community for 8 days whilst unwell,” she said.