Two Australian passengers evacuated to Darwin test positive for coronavirus

The coronavirus outbreak on the Diamond Princess has now spread to Australia, after two Australian evacuees tested positive in Darwin.

Two Australians evacuated from the coronavirus-hit Diamond Princess cruise ship have tested positive for the virus in Darwin.

The two infected passengers — a 24-year-old woman from Adelaide, and another person from Western Australia — were among six evacuees from the Diamond Princess who arrived at Darwin airport yesterday with cold-like symptoms.

All six were tested, with two results returning positive.

A reported 164 Australian passengers on the Diamond Princess were evacuated by a special Qantas flight yesterday and taken to a facility at Howard Springs, near Darwin, for a two-week quarantine.

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The pair that tested positive and are understood to be well and will be flown to their home states to be treated for coronavirus, also known as COVID-19.

The Adelaide woman was due to be taken to Royal Adelaide Hospital today.

Australian evacuees from the coronavirus-struck cruise ship Diamond Princess deplane a Qantas flight from Japan at Darwin International Airport in Darwin. Picture: AAP/Helen Orr

“Those people remain well and mildly ill with cold-like symptoms and they do not necessarily need to be in the hospital system,” acting NT chief health officer Dianne Stephens said.

“Both these individuals will be taken into their hospital systems to watch to see whether or not they’re going to improve or deteriorate.

“Then their own health systems have systems in place to manage the COVID-19 infected patients.”

The four others who came down with cold-like symptoms and were tested for coronavirus have been cleared to leave isolation.

“They will be released from isolation today back into the usual accommodation blocks that we have set aside for the Japanese cohort,” Ms Stephens said.

Government agencies gather near buses taking cruise ship passengers to the Howard Springs quarantine facility. Picture: AAP/Helen Orr

The Australian Government’s chief medical officer Brendan Murphy said more positive tests among the evacuees were possible.

“There has been ongoing detection of infection on the Diamond Princess cruise ship over the last few days, so it’s not unexpected that some people might have been incubating the virus,” he said.

“It’s possible more people could develop positive tests over the next few days. We don’t know that, but if they do we are completely well set up to detect and manage them and isolate them.”

The Australians evacuated from the Diamond Princess were screened before being cleared to leave the ship, docked at the port of Yokohama near Tokyo.

They were screened multiple more times as they were taken by bus to Haneda Airport, where they boarded a chartered Qantas flight on Wednesday night and were flown to Darwin.

The Diamond Princess cruise ship spent two weeks in quarantine off Yokohama, Japan. Picture: Tomohiro Ohsumi/Getty Images

“All passengers were health screened before being allowed to leave the ship, none had positive tests or any symptoms of disease,” Prof Murphy said.

“They were monitored throughout the flight, screened again at the RAAF Base in Darwin and again on arrival at (Howard Springs).

“Six people were identified as having minor respiratory symptoms and/or fever. They were immediately separated from others at the airport and went directly into isolation at the village.

“Two of those people have since tested positive for COVID-19 infection.”

The Diamond Princess has spent the past two weeks in quarantine off the coast of Yokohama.

It has seen the largest cluster of coronavirus cases outside mainland China with more than 620 passengers and crew testing positive for the virus, including 46 Australians.

Two Japanese passengers, a man, 87, and the woman, 84, died yesterday in hospital after contracting the virus.

There were originally about 3700 passengers and crew on the ship, which docked at Yokohama earlier this month after a two-week voyage around Southeast Asia.

The two new cases takes the total number of coronavirus cases in Australia to 17. Ten of those people have recovered.

More than 76,200 cases of coronavirus has been confirmed worldwide, with more than 2240 deaths.