Baw Baw was considered for lockdown, but escaped for now.
COVID-19 Response Commander Jeroen Weimar (left) gets a run down of the rapid testing clinic at Lardner Park from West Gippsland Healthcare Group operations manager Tania Piner this morning. Mr Weimar congratulated and thanked staff for their work.
Speaking at the Lardner Park rapid testing site today, COVID-19 Response Commander Jeroen Weimar said a big part of yesterday’s debate among authorities was whether the Latrobe lockdown should extend to Baw Baw.
“Sometimes it’s a regional approach that is needed but we don’t want to unnecessarily plunge another 40,000 people into lockdown.
“We are confident we can keep Latrobe locked down for a few days without impacting Baw Baw,” he said.
With 21 active cases now in Latrobe, the State Government last night announced a seven day lockdown for the municipality, effective from midnight last night.
Mr Weimar said there was one new case in Baw Baw today, taking the total to four active cases.
He said the new case today was linked to a previous case.
He said there was not significant concern about the Baw Baw positives because “they are cases that have connections to metro workers.”
“We aren’t too worried at this stage,” he said.
Mr Weimar said the Latrobe cluster now extended to 19 households and 80 primary contacts with an illegal gathering being the “epicentre” of the Latrobe outbreak.
“It appears there was a grand final gathering on Saturday with 13 households involved.
“That is hugely concerning. It highlights the risks of these household gathering and now we have a significant risk,” he said.
Mr Weimar said it was “frustrating” that people did not follow the rules.
A rapid drive through testing clinic set up by West Gippsland Healthcare Group at Lardner Park had tested almost 100 people by 11am this morning.
Yesterday, the clinic tested 375 people.
Wait times have been minimal today, with the longest wait time of 20 minutes recorded when the clinic first opened this morning.
The clinic will remain open until 5pm today.
The site opened yesterday in response to two tier two exposure sites identified in Baw Baw – Woolworths Drouin between 2pm and 3.15pm on Friday and Bunnings Warragul between 10.30am to 11.15am on Friday.
Anyone who has attended a tier two exposure site at the specified times is urged to get a COVID test and stay home until they get a negative result.
Mr Weimar explained a tier two exposure site was considered a lower risk of transmission.
He said tier one sites were usually classified as high exposure risk because of the length of time a person was at the site, such as a workplace; or, in settings where there may not have been masks worn and shared bathrooms such as a restaurant or gym.
Mr Weimar said an example of a tier two site was someone “popping into a Bunnings store for 15 minutes to buy a drill.”
He urged community members to QR code into all settings.
He said contact tracers allowed extra time either side of the check-in time and estimated departure time to try to cover the exact time someone was at an exposure site.
Mr Weimar said it was unusual if someone QR coded into a premises that they would not receive a text from the Health Department when the premises became an exposure site.
“We are aware not everyone checks in but that’s why QR codes are critical, the whole thing is automated and allows people to get good advice when it happens,” he said.