Victorian health authorities are expecting more coronavirus cases after it was found that a Melburnian who tested positive for COVID-19 attended an AFL match with more than 20,000 others.
The infected person is from Melbourne’s north and one of nine active community cases linked to a cluster that has the potential to send the city back into a snap lockdown.
New alerts also include regional Victorian venues, and the outbreak has prompted other state leaders to further tighten border controls.
Among them is South Australia, which has banned travellers from Whittlesea – which is at the centre of this week’s outbreak – and imposed quarantine rules for Melburnians.
Just before midnight Tuesday, the Victorian Department of Health revealed the positive case had attended the match between Collingwood and Port Adelaide last Sunday afternoon.
They sat in zone four, level one of the Melbourne Cricket Ground’s Great Southern Stand.
The health department is urging any of the 23,415 spectators who went to that game to monitor for symptoms.
Tweet from @rwillingham
It will, in the meantime, direct contact those who were seated in a bay between M1 and M16, and advise them to isolate until they return a negative test.
It will also review CCTV footage of the match to determine if those who were seated in other areas of the MCG should also get tested and isolate, regardless of whether they have symptomst.
Tweet from @VicGovDH
The department has reassured people that the AFL and Melbourne Cricket Club “have prepared for this situation in multiple simulations”.
They said fans’ contact information has been linked to ticketing data and QR codes, which will assist contact tracers.
The alert comes as a public health advisory panel mulls whether further restrictions will be required for large events.
That includes AFL games such as Friday night’s Marvel Stadium clash between the Western Bulldogs and Demons, and the RISING festival, which begins on Wednesday.
The Victorian Department is bracing for more coronavirus cases. Photo: Getty
A hair salon in Bendigo and a tavern in Axedale, both in central Victoria and attended by a coronavirus case, have been added to the growing list of COVID-19 exposure sites.
Four more infections were confirmed on Tuesday afternoon after a man in his 60s returned a positive result earlier in the day.
Authorities believe he was the source of infection for the previous four reported on Monday, meaning the outbreak investigation has moved further “upstream” and is closer to finding the missing link with the Wollert case.
Victoria’s chief health officer Brett Sutton warned there might be further cases on Wednesday, although 84 of 168 primary close contacts have so far tested negative.
“We have to chase down every single close contact … but it’s certainly not out of control,” he told ABC Radio Melbourne on Tuesday.
The following restrictions are in place for Greater Melbourne:
Across Australia, other states and territories have responded to the Melbourne cluster by introducing their own travel rules.
-with AAP