Coronavirus: Contact tracing teams swamped as count surges

All 32 locked-down local government areas in Melbourne and the ­Mitchell Shire on Wednesday had at least three known active cases of COVID-19.

COVID-19 testing at Fawkner in Melbourne on Wednesday. Picture: David Crosling

In a clear demonstration of just how widespread the virus is across the city, all 32 locked-down local government areas across metropolitan Melbourne and the ­Mitchell Shire on Wednesday had at least three known active cases of COVID-19.

In 24 of these, there were at least 10 cases while 12 had at least 50 cases.

In a further indication of the challenge facing authorities with Victoria’s second wave, there have been 790 cases of COVID-19 with no identified source, including 458 in the fortnight to Wednesday, with cases added to that tally only once the contact tracing process has been completed.

Another 209 of Victoria’s 238 new COVID-19 cases on Wednesday remained “under investi­gation” as contact tracing teams struggled to keep up with 1931 ­active cases and their close contacts — 1516 more than they were dealing with two weeks ago.

 

As the active cases have risen, so have hospital admissions, with the number hospitalised with corona­virus passing 100 for the first time on Wednesday.

There are 105 people in hospital, including 27 in ICU, of whom 22 are on a ventilator.

On Tuesday, the most recent day for which statistics are available, those in intensive care included a man in his 30s, four people in their 40s and five people in their 50s.

The death in hospital of a woman in her 90s was the fifth coronavirus death in as many days, bringing Victoria’s fatal toll from the virus to 27.

The 238 new cases from 27,040 tests processed on Tuesday represent a 0.88 per cent positive test rate — much better than Tuesday‘s 1.23 per cent rate but still the state’s third-worst positive test rate on record.

The grim statistics came as Victoria‘s Department of Health and Human Services revealed that six people who have tested positive to COVID-19 attended the Black Lives Matter protest in Melbourne’s CBD on June 6 — two more than previously publicly confirmed.

That followed The Australian's report on Wednesday that the department had confirmed a link between a family cluster of at least 30 cases that included two protest attendees, and the outbreak of at least 247 cases in public housing towers in Melbourne’s inner northwest.

In a statement on Wednesday afternoon, DHHS said: “We are aware of six confirmed cases who attended the Black Lives Matter protest. Currently there is no evidence to suggest they acquired the virus from the protest.

“None of these cases are (sic) known to reside at a major public housing complex. Currently no known nor suspected episodes of transmission occurred at the protest itself.”

The Australian has put questions to the department on when the two previously unpublicised protest attendees tested positive to COVID-19 and why their cases had not been made public.

Another question was whether a source of infection had been established for all six protest attendees and if not, how the depart­ment determined they did not contract the virus at the protest.

When the department revealed on June 11 that the first protest attendee had tested positive, it said he “may have been infectious” at the rally, although no links are known to have been made between him and other protesters who tested positive.