Coronavirus: Victoria’s hotel quarantine report on horizon

The board of inquiry set up to examine Victoria’s hotel quarantine program will deliver its findings on Monday.

Hotel inquiry chair Jennifer Coate.

The board of inquiry set up to examine Victoria’s hotel quarantine program, which triggered the state’s second wave of infections, will deliver its findings on Monday.

The date is the last available for retired judge Jennifer Coate to hand down her findings.

Amid speculation the report could be delivered several days early, the board revealed the timing on Tuesday afternoon.

An interim report, detailing recommendations for reopening hotel quarantine, was handed down on November 6, with Victoria’s revamped program reopened last week.

Monday’s report is expected to focus on the “decisions, ­actions of and communications between relevant agencies” in establishing Victoria’s initial hotel quarantine program, and any further recommendations.

Breaches by private security guards in Victoria’s hotel quarantine program in May and June led to the state’s second wave of coronavirus, sparking more than 18,000 infections, 801 deaths, and a 3½-month lockdown.

The inquiry’s hearings prompted the resignations of Jenny Mikakos as health minister and Chris Eccles as secretary of the Department of Premier and Cabinet.

However, no politician, public servant or political staffer has taken responsibility for the ­decision to use private security guards in hotel quarantine.

As of Tuesday, Victoria had a total of 1144 people in its ­revamped hotel quarantine program, including 93 who were being accommodated in a “health hotel” because of testing positive for coronavirus, displaying symptoms or having other complex health needs, and eight voluntary support people staying with returned travellers.

A further 127 overseas travellers were expected to arrive on Tuesday.

Of 127 who arrived on Monday, 13 were sent to Melbourne’s Novotel South Wharf “health hotel”, and the remaining 114 have been accommodated at the Pan Pacific.

Of the 13, five had displayed coronavirus symptoms or were close contacts of those who had, while the remaining eight had other complex health needs.

Tuesday marked 46 days since Victoria had a new ­community-acquired case of coronavirus.

The seven cases among returned travellers in Victorian hotel quarantine include a boy aged under five, a woman in her 20s, two women and a man in their 30s, and a man and a woman in their 50s.

The boy’s parents are among the six adults to have tested positive in hotel quarantine.

There were 8296 tests processed in Victoria in the 24 hours to Tuesday.

The state has now recorded a total of 20,352 confirmed cases, including those diagnosed in quarantine.

This represents 72.6 per cent of the 28,031 confirmed cases ­nationwide since the pandemic began.