Six new cases in Cedar Meats coronavirus outbreak this weekend
Seventy-seven people associated with the Cedar Meats coronavirus outbreak have now tested positive for the virus.
SEVENTY-seven people associated with a Melbourne meat processing facility have now tested positive for coronavirus.
It has been just over a week since Victorian Health Minister Jenny Mikakos announced an unnamed Melbourne abattoir, later revealed as Cedar Meats in Brooklyn, had closed due to a coronavirus outbreak.
Premier Daniel Andrews announced this morning that one of the seven new cases across Victoria yesterday was associated with the abattoir outbreak, taking the total number of cases in the cluster to 77.
One of the 10 new cases across Victoria on Saturday and four of the state’s 10 new cases on Friday were associated with the abattoir outbreak.
At least 59 cases in the cluster are Cedar Meats workers and 16 are close contacts.
The Department of Health and Government’s handling of the outbreak has been the subject of much criticism, as it refused to name the abattoir and reveal when the first worker tested positive until last week.
The first case linked to the worksite in Brooklyn was diagnosed on Friday, April 24, but the first Cedar Meats employee to test positive for coronavirus, but not directly linked with the worksite, was diagnosed on April 2.
However, on Friday, Prime Minister Scott Morrison commended Victoria’s response to the outbreak.
“I commend (Victorian) Premier (Daniel) Andrews on the way that he has sought to address this issue,” Mr Morrison said.
Chief Medical Officer Professor Brendan Murphy added he was confident the outbreak at Cedar Meats was under control.
“It’s not surprising when you get an outbreak in a workplace such as this it will spread significantly,” Prof Murphy said.
“The important thing is not the size of the outbreak. The important thing is the response and the response is testing everybody, every contact, locking the place down, closing it down, quarantining and isolating — all of those things have been done and I’m very confident that outbreak is under control.”
It comes as the Victorian Government is accused of ignoring calls to work with the federal Department of Agriculture on delivering nationally consistent health protocols to minimise the spread of coronavirus in food processing plants.
There have been 1494 cases of coronavirus across Victoria.
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