Coronavirus sleuths trace Crossroads cluster to interstate truckie

Genomic sequencing has connected a unique Victorian strain of COVID-19 to the outbreak in southwest Sydney.

The Crossroads Hotel in southwest Sydney. Picture: Getty Images

Genomic sequencing has connected a unique Victorian strain of COVID-19 to the outbreak in southwest Sydney after virus detectives traced the contagion back to a Melbourne freight worker who told doctors he didn’t think he was “particularly unwell” when he attended a work party at the Crossroads Hotel on July 3.

Health Minister Brad Hazzard said NSW was entering a “war zone” after cases linked to the Crossroads Hotel cluster in Casula jumped to 34 on Wednesday.

“We have had massive pressure in the pop-up clinics,” Mr Hazzard said, adding that almost 3300 people had come forward for testing on Tuesday at the Crossroads Hotel and Picton Imperial Hotel.

Chief Health Officer Kerry Chant said already stretched health workers would continue to aim for “high rates of testing”, despite clear signs that pop-up clinics in Sydney’s southwest were under strain. “I’m very concerned about areas where we may have had a number of visitors from Melbourne — in particular from the Mitchell Shire — and also particularly the coastal suburbs and our border communities,” she said.

Long queues of cars were observed for a fourth straight day outside the Crossroads Hotel on Wednesday, despite NSW Health opening two further pop-up clinics at the nearby suburbs of Leumeah and Prestons.

Health officials urged people to visit walk-in clinics at Liverpool Hospital, Campbelltown Hospital, Camden Hospital, Bankstown Hospital and Fairfield Hospital in a bid to ease pressure on drive-through clinics.

Jennie Musto — described as NSW Health’s “chief virus detective” — said Sydney’s ballooning Crossroads Hotel cluster had been traced back to a dinner party attended by colleagues from the same workplace. “A man from Melbourne came into a workplace in Sydney, and then there’s some transmission within that workplace,” she said.

“Then they all went to a party that night of the third of July. This is where it all began.

“From there, we’ve uncovered an additional 32 cases to the Crossroads Hotel and from there we’ve learned that the most likely link.”

The man worked in the freight industry but was not driving a truck when he travelled to Sydney on June 30.

Dr Chant said there was just one recent case — a man from the Blue Mountains — whose virus strain does not match the Victorian strain.

The possibility of community spread, however, could not be dismissed unless health officials were able to definitively rule out a link between the Blue Mountains case and Victoria’s outbreak, she said.

Dr Chant said health officials needed a “two-week period of ­assurance” to confirm virus detectives had blocked the chains of transmission from the Crossroads cluster.

Even so, the breakthrough has not come in time for at least 19 struggling pubs, clubs and restaurants in southwest Sydney that were forced to close their doors after their businesses were potentially exposed to the virus by infected customers.

The Wests Leagues Club in Leu­meah and Macarthur Tavern in Campbelltown said their doors would be shut from Wednesday after infected patrons linked to the Crossroads cluster visited the ­venues at the weekend.

A Woolworths store at Bowral in the Southern Highlands confirmed on Wednesday that a staff member returned a positive after working there on July 12.

In 24 hours to 8pm Tuesday, there were 13 new cases in NSW.