While no new locally acquired COVID-19 cases have been reported overnight in Victoria, the discovery of three new locally acquired cases in Brisbane and Moreton Bay – one was linked to an airport worker and the other two to a mother and daughter – has meant that the lockdown there has been extended by a further 24 hours.
Queensland Premier Anastacia Palaszczuk announced that while the lockdown would be lifted in the rest of the state the extension of the lockdown in the two centres would give contact tracers more time to do their work.
“Now we will come back early tomorrow morning, once our contact tracers get on top of this and we will look at the case numbers overnight. I want to thank everyone for doing the right thing but as you can see, we’ve just got a situation at the moment that has just come in and we really need to give the people, our contact tracers, the time to do that,” Ms Palaszczuk told the ABC.
Queensland Police Deputy Commissioner Steve Gollchewski said there were 3,097 people in hotel quarantine, of whom 2,459 were international passengers and the remainder, 753, were domestic.
The state’s deputy premier, Steven Miles, said 259 arrivals were expected today and this included 58 air crew.
“Unfortunately, we can’t predict how many domestic arrivals will come from hot spots or how many contacts will need that hotel quarantine accommodation.
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“We know we have 285 rooms becoming available but it will take seven days for our police and hotel quarantine coordinators to get a new hotel up and running and so it’s absolutely critical that we see that cut in the number of international visitors and we would hope that the Prime Minister agrees to that at National Cabinet today” Mr Miles said.
Meanwhile in Victoria, the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) reported that in the 24 hours to midnight on 2 July, there three new overseas acquired cases and no local on interstate-acquired cases.
The department said there 32 active cases in the state and 24,726 test results had been received. Over the same 24-hour period, 19, 470 COVID-19 vaccinations were conducted bringing the total in the state to 1,121,235.
