Dinner party claimed to be linked to North West outbreak

Australia’s chief medical officer has made a startling revelation on live TV.

One social media rumour about the source of the North West’s COVID-19 outbreak has been backed by the country’s top doctor.

Australia’s Chief Medical Officer has claimed that this weekend’s Tasmanian health care coronavirus cluster was due to an illegal party of medical workers.

Professor Brendan Murphy made the startling revelation, unprompted, in a public briefing, which was broadcast online as well as on New Zealand television.

Sky News New Zealand Correspondent Jackson Williams said the NZ committee was set up to scrutinise responses to the current health crisis.

Geez...As reported by @jacksonw____ - Aust CMO Brendan Murphy has dropped a bit of a bombshell to a NZ Committee: "A cluster of 49 cases in a hospital in Tasmania just over the weekend...but most of them went to an illegal dinner party of medical workers!"

— Thomas O'Brien (@TJ__OBrien) April 13, 2020

“You have to be prepared to deal with further outbreaks,” Prof Murphy says.

“We thought we were doing really well then in the last week we had a cluster of 49 cases in a hospital in Tasmania just over the weekend. Most of them went to an illegal dinner party of medical workers.”

In the last two press conferences Premier Peter Gutwein and Director of Public Health Dr Mark Veitch have been specifically asked if there had been a party with North West healthcare workers. They denied the allegations.

Yesterday Mr Gutwein hit-out at rumours circulating on Facebook.

Prof Murphy was on a call to a New Zealand health committee when he used the Tasmanian case as an example for why officials needed to be prepared for outbreaks even as they eradicate the virus.

“You have to be prepared to deal with further outbreaks,” he said.

“We thought we were doing really well in the last week and then we had a cluster of 49 cases in a hospital in Tasmania just over the weekend.

“Most of them went to an illegal dinner party of medical workers we think.”

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The source of the cluster is not yet known, but the first confirmed case of COVID19 at the hospital in the town of Burnie was a returned Ruby Princess passenger who later died.

The outbreak has forced the Tasmanian government to close two hospitals, quarantine at least 1000 health workers and a 3,000 other people in the area and lockdown the region.

Prof Murphy told his New Zealand counterparts they were lucky the coronavirus-riddled ship had dropped the majority of passengers off in Australia.

“I think you’re very lucky the Ruby Princess unloaded in Sydney rather than in New Zealand because that’s become a bit of a saga here,” he said.

Tasmanian Director of Public Health Dr Mark Veitch said on Monday while experts were still investigating the source of the cluster at the North West Regional Hospital the Ruby Princess passengers were an obvious lead.

“We know that the that the first person managed at the hospital with the coronavirus infection was a person from Ruby Princess cruise who sadly died, as did another person from the Ruby Princess a week or so later, so that’s obviously one of our strongest leads the source of infection,” he said.

However there has since been two further coronavirus deaths at the hospital that were not identified as connections to the Ruby Princess.