AnglicareSA has confirmed two employees at its Brompton aged care home, 3km north west of the Adelaide CBD, tested positive to COVID-19 on Sunday, 15 November, as a growing cluster of new cases in Adelaide’s north suburbs expanded to 17 people yesterday.
South Australia’s Chief Public Health Office Nichola Spurrier (pictured above) confirmed the facility was in lockdown yesterday after the positive results.
AnglicareSA says the staff – both now quarantined in a medi-hotel – had not been at work since Friday 13 November, and have not worked at any of its other aged care homes.
As a safety precaution, the provider said it would limit access to its other aged care homes and disability services for the next 48 hours.
The cases come after just four new cases were reported the previous day.
Of the 17 new cases, 15 are believed to belong to the same family.
Hotel quarantine again the source of outbreak
The outbreak was reportedly sparked by a family member who had been working at one of Adelaide’s quarantine hotels.
An 81-year-old woman, who is not an aged care resident, was identified as the first positive test.
“We just kept getting positives coming off the machine,” Ms Spurrier told ABC Radio on Monday.
“We haven’t got the genomics yet, but I’m absolutely certain it has come from a medi-hotel.”
In response, Queensland, Victoria, Tasmania, the Northern Territory and Western Australia have all re-imposed restrictions on travellers coming from South Australia.
SA Health is urging people to monitor for symptoms and get tested.
Aged care response centre set up, SA cluster a “wake up call” – PM
In an interview on 3AW, Prime Minister Scott Morrison confirmed the Federal and SA governments had set up an aged care response centre similar to that established in Victoria.
“We’ve already stood up the aged care response, like the one we had in Victoria that we set up there. And so, again, moving quickly. There are excellent facilities there because of staff, not because of residents, that we’ve put into a lockdown amongst those facilities,” he said.
“It’s a reminder, even after, you know, a lockdown, even after all of this time, the virus hasn’t gone anywhere and it can be activated. And that’s why none of us can be off our game. And we’ve got to match fit on this all the time.”
17 days with no new cases in Victoria
The news was better from Victoria, as the state notched up its 17th consecutive day with no new cases of deaths reported.
This brought the number of active cases state-wide to three.
The state did see a drop in testing numbers however, with just 6,695 tests received.
