Testing bungle leaves thousands needlessly isolating

A computer crash has caused thousands of Victorians to needlessly isolate after it plunged the state’s COVID-19 testing system into chaos.

Thousands of Victorians have been forced to needlessly isolate at home after a computer crash plunged the state’s COVID-19 testing system into chaos.

A computer outage at private coronavirus test contractor Dorevitch Pathology early on Thursday meant one in four Victorians awaiting the results of a recent COVID-19 test were not able to be told they had negative results.

It comes as the state’s first mystery infection in more than month, recorded earlier in the week, was traced back to Sydney’s Northern Beaches outbreak and no new cases were recorded.

Tens of thousands of Victorians have been ordered to isolate until they returned a negative coronavirus test after visiting exposure sites such as the MCG and Chadstone Shopping Centres.

Others are desperately hoping for negative results so they can be cleared from 14-day quarantine after returning from NSW red zones.

Dorevitch Pathology processes a quarter of Victoria’s coronavirus tests, but suffered a mass blackout when its IT system crashed in the early hours of Thursday.

Victoria’s testing count has ramped up since coronavirus returned to the state

The Department of Health and Human Services told the Herald Sun the computer crash did not impact the actual processing of any of the 32,000 coronavirus tests undertaken on Wednesday – nor the tens of thousands undertaken on Thursday – while provision had been made to notify anyone who tested positive for COVID-19.

Dorevitch’s systems were still down at 4.30pm when a staff member told the Herald Sun it was difficult to be connected to the appropriate person because the internal phone system had crashed with the IT network.

“The Department understands that the Dorevitch pathology laboratory is currently experiencing an IT outage,” the DHHS spokeswoman said.

“This has not affected the processing of coronavirus tests, and any positive results will be notified promptly to a patient’s treating doctor and the contact tracing team.”

An inner-city Melbourne couple who were first in line for a test on Tuesday morning were still waiting for their result late yesterday in order to leave home – after more than 55 hours.

“It’s so incredibly frustrating to wait more than two days and reinforces the worry of an already bad situation,’’ he said.

Its understood the Health Department and Andrews Government were in discussions about the situation from at least 7am, however testing commander Jeroen Weimar said he was not aware of any issues when asked on Thursday if he was aware of technical problems.

“Our pathology labs are working phenomenally hard at the moment,” he said.

“They’ve processed almost 180,000 tests over the first six days of January.”

There are now 28 cases linked to the Smile Buffalo/Black Rock cluster

Mr Weimar said the “vast majority” of people were getting their results the next day.

About 60,000 people had applied for permits to come back across the border over the New Year’s Eve and New Year’’s Day period and just under half of these have been tested so far.

“We’ll continue to follow up the people who we have outstanding test results for,” Mr Weimar said.

“We send out initial reminder text messages, we will then hit the phones and when necessary we will go into a door knock stage.”

Genetic testing on Thursday revealed the mystery Vermont South case, a man in his 30s, was infected by the same strain that had spread from New South Wales.

Zara at Chadstone Shopping Centre was added as a potential exposure site for December 26 after the man’s phone data was used to analyse his movements on the day.

“We ask you to come forward and get tested now, if you were at Zara on Boxing Day, particularly if you were feeling unwell on Boxing Day,” Mr Weimar said.

There are now 28 cases linked to the Black Rock cluster.