University students recruited to help contact tracing

Victorian university students are being urgently called to boost the state’s contact tracing teams as authorities race to stem the latest COVID outbreak.

Victoria’s contact-tracing efforts have been outrun by the speed at which the latest Covid mutant strain is spreading.

Senior health officials say they have been ordered to work overtime to get on top of the workload.

But efforts were hampered with coronavirus call centre phone lines jammed, sparking fears vital information was being missed.

Acting Premier James Merlino said the virus was outpacing contact tracers, despite their “extraordinary work”.

“They have never, ever worked as hard, as fast and ­effectively as they are right now, but despite that, this variant is moving at a faster pace,” he said on Thursday.

Chief health officer Brett Sutton said the new Indian variant was spreading twice as fast in Victoria as the peak of coronavirus throughout 2020.

It has seen the current cluster grow to 26 cases, with more than 10,000 primary and secondary contacts identified across more than 150 exposure sites by Thursday.

Chief Health Officer Brett Sutton has backed Victoria’s contact tracers. Picture: Andrew Henshaw

Prof Sutton said it was estimated the current Reff number – the number of people a positive case infects – was about five, double the peak in mid-April last year.

The new strain in Victoria is the B1.617 or Indian variant, a far more contagious version.

Melbourne University students on Thursday were being recruited as part of an “urgent callout” to bolster the state’s contact-tracing team.

That callout was to a group of medical, nursing and allied health students, who were told in a message.

“This role will be working in our public health contact-tracing team (never alone always supported and as part of a group) ... calling people, data analysis, data entry, IT skills,”it said.

“We will pay you and can offer a regular shift after we get out of crisis mode if interested.”

The students were told to email the director of the North Eastern Public Health Unit, and include “whether you are medical, nursing or allied health (and level of training) in the subject line and that you are offering assistance for COVID-19 contact tracing”.

“Together we hope to quell this outbreak,” the message said.

Despite being lauded as “gold standard”, Victoria’s problem-plagued contact tracing system has faced repeated issues and was overwhelmed as the virus ran rampant across the state last year.

But Prof Sutton launched a staunch defence of the system on Thursday, saying the suggestion it had failed in the latest outbreak was a “false narrative”.

“That is absurd,” Mr Sutton said after repeated questions about the system.

“It is an absurd proposition that contract tracing has gone wrong.”

Contact tracers have so far managed to identify first, second and third-ring contacts within 24 hours, but the concern now is their ability to keep up with the Indian variant.

People get tested at IPC Health in Deer Park. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Sarah Matray

“I will get fired up when contact tracers are attacked. They do extraordinary work and do it brilliantly. 10,000 contacts found! The false narrative hurts real people, mentally,” Prof Sutton said.

“Now is not the time to try to find an imaginary scapegoat. It’s the time to support Victorians going through another ­really tough time.”

But opposition health spokeswoman Georgie Crozier said failures in the system were to blame for the latest lockdown. “Victorians are rightfully asking why we are the only state to be thrown into a fourth lockdown,” she said.

“Victorians’ hard work and co-operation beat the second wave, despite the many mistakes of the Andrews government and its bungled contact tracing. The Labor Andrews government’s so-called gold standard contact tracing has failed to prevent yet another lockdown that will once again devastate thousands of small businesses.”

The list of exposure sites on Thursday spread from Melbourne’s northern suburbs to the city’s inner south and regional Victoria. Any visitors to Tier 1 sites must get tested and isolate for 14 days.