The launch of the NZ-Aus travel bubble was followed by pictures of people tearing up after seeing loved ones at both Sydney and Auckland airports, hugging friends and family whom they have not seen in person for more than a year now.
They were definitely heartwarming and give all the rest of us hope that maybe that may happen for us as well, especially for those of us with friends and family in other countries.
However, COVID-19 decides to become the “fun police” and quickly put a stop to that by giving Australia a brand-new outbreak which resulted in lockdowns in Perth and Peel.
Contact tracing and testing are ongoing.
Infected during hotel quarantine
It seems like the outbreak stemmed from a failure in its hotel quarantine system; a system that unfortunately has had seen multiple breaches before.
In this case, it looks like it might be something related to the ventilation between hotel rooms on the same floor.
The “patient zero” in this outbreak is a 54-year-old Victorian man.
He tested negative for the virus and was subsequently released after he ended his 14-day quarantine.
He went about his business in the Perth and Peel region for 5 days.
Unfortunately, he ended up testing positive last Friday morning while staying at a Victorian “health hotel” for international arrivals with COVID-19.
Considering that he wasn’t in close contact with any COVID-19-positive people during his trip in Perth, and that the couple that returned from India who was staying next to him had tested positive for the virus, it was suspected that he might have caught the virus during his hotel quarantine.
The subsequent contract tracing and testing scramble
His friend, whom he visited after his quarantine, has since then tested positive as well.
Just a few hours ago, another local transmission case was detected from the contact tracing effort in Perth, with many more residents anxiously awaiting their testing results.
The man, who is in his 40s, was suspected to have caught the virus from “patient zero” at the Kitchen Inn in Kardinya on April 18.
Yesterday, Victorian authorities were scrambling to track down the man’s fellow passengers who were on the same Qantas Perth-to-Melbourne flight (QF778) as he was.
They have managed to track down all 265 passengers, and have required all of them to self-isolate for 14 days and undergo COVID-19 testing.
49 out of the 265 tested have returned negative results.
Way to burst our collective bubbles, COVID-19!
And it didn’t even wait for a week before doing so.
This travel bubble has been hailed as the first of its kind, giving many travel-deprived people hope that one day, more major travel bubbles might be established.
However, the recent COVID-19 outbreak in Australia resulting in a snap 3-day lockdown of Perth and Peel became the pin that burst the bubble of hope for many.
The New Zealand COVID-19 government website released an update that stated that “As set out in our Trans-Tasman bubble protocols, travel between New Zealand and Western Australia has been paused, pending further advice from the state government.”
Featured Image: Anna LoFi/ Shutterstock.com
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