A coronavirus-infected woman who fled locked-down Melbourne with her husband and went on a 1,900km road trip may have crossed the NSW-Queensland border at a remote town to avoid detection.
Health authorities in Victoria, NSW and Queensland are scrambling to track down hundreds of people who may have been exposed to the virus during their interstate trip.
The woman, 44, tested positive on Wednesday but may have been infectious from the day she left Melbourne on June 1, which was already in lockdown.
Police believe the couple crossed the NSW-Queensland border at the remote rural town of Goondiwindi on June 5 in a bid to evade authorities.
Exposure sites from the Queensland coronavirus case.(Google) I think there s a lot of anger and disappointment really that people would do this. People s lives are at stake and also people s livelihoods with shutdowns. A lot of disappointment and anger, Dr Willett said.
The 44-year-old woman returned a positive test yesterday the same day Melburnians were given the all-clear to exit a two-week lockdown, sparking more than 20 health alerts across regional NSW and south-east Queensland.
Infectious diseases expert Paul Griffin told Today that Queensland health authorities were working hard to determine whether the infected woman has the highly contagious Delta strain, first detected in India.
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Subscriber only A Melbourne couple has skipped Victoria s lockdown and brought the Covid-19 virus to Queensland with health authorities scrambling to minimise the chance of a potential outbreak. It s understood the case involving a 44-year-old woman was picked up by sheer luck, with the couple only getting tested so her husband could get a Covid clearance requested by his workplace. The situation threatens to ruin Queensland s run of no locally acquired cases for nine weeks. The woman returned the shock positive in Caloundra on the Sunshine Coast on Tuesday after leaving Greater Melbourne with her partner on June 1, despite Victoria entering lockdown on May 28.
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