Queensland on alert, with two new COVID cases
Unlinked transmission of the virus on a Gold Coast still remains of concern. Photo: Getty
Queensland has two more local COVID infections, both in home isolation and linked to an existing case.
Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk the new cases were picked up among 9474 tests in the 24 hours to 6.30am on Friday.
They are a young girl and a woman who are linked to a case in the Goondiwindi cluster, in the state’s south.
“We’ve got two community cases and they are linked, which is good news, both in home quarantine, so not a risk,” Ms Palaszczuk said on Friday.
There is more concern about two mystery cases that emerged on the Gold Coast over the past two days.
One is a fully-vaccinated man in his 50s who is an Uber driver. Contact tracers are working to find any passengers potentially exposed over the three days he was infectious in the community.
Deputy chief health officer Peter Aitken said authorities were determining if there was a mystery case who spread the virus between the Gold Coast cases.
“Seeing if there’s a common link, see if they’ve come in contact together, or see if there’s that one other link that may be evident, that has brought those two people together somehow or shared COVID between them,” he said.
Ms Palaszczuk said there were no immediate plans for a lockdown on the Gold Coast, and tighter restrictions would depend on if there was further spread in coming days.
“It depends on a whole range of circumstances, and we don’t even want to entertain that at the moment,” she said.
“If you live on the Gold Coast, let me make it very clear – we need to make sure that we do not have community transmission.”
Ms Palaszczuk said in the meantime it was still safe for people from other areas of Queensland to visit the Gold Coast.
However, she urged people in the region to wear masks if they could not socially distance.
“Of course it’s safe to go there, but people just need to be mindful that we’ve had two unlinked cases on the Gold Coast. That could mean there are more,” she said.
The annual Schoolies Week celebration will go ahead if there are no more cases but authorities have warned the Gold Coast is not out of the woods and the next seven days will be crucial in deciding if the end-of-year school leavers’ party is allowed. Dr Aitken said the schoolies celebration was a worrying aspect of the latest case spread.
“We beg you to come forward, get tested and we need really high testing numbers. And if we can see no more cases come through over the next seven days, it puts us in an amazing position,” he said.
Ms Palazczuk was also worried about schoolies week.
“We don’t want to cancel Schoolies. I want Schoolies to go ahead. It depends what happens over the next few days,” she said.
“The next 24-48 hours is going to be very critical.”
Ms Palaszczuk also urged Queenslanders to continue to get vaccinated, with the state approaching 70 per cent fully vaccinated.
Under the Queensland government’s roadmap, all fully-vaccinated domestic travellers will be able home quarantine, provided they have open air access to their homes and live within two hours’ drive of an airport, once that target is hit.
Ms Palaszczuk said unlike the face mask mandate ending the moment the state hit 80 per cent first dose, she would announce when home quarantine rules changed at 70 per cent.
Queensland also had two new cases in hotel quarantine on Friday.
-with AAP