Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk said none of the new cases were located in the Hotel Grand Chancellor. There are currently 38 active cases in Queensland.However, genomic sequencing had linked two cases of the virus on the same floor of the Hotel Grand Chancellor and a doctor at the Princess Alexandra Hospital.The hotel has been put into lockdown and will not be taking anymore guests for quarantine.Ms Palaszczuk said it would be another 24 hours before authorities could be confident that there has been no community transmission linked to a doctor who tested positive on Friday last week.A total of 272 close contacts of the doctor have been identified plus a further 160 in the Princess Alexandra Hospital – with 86 tested and coming back negative Monday.Deputy Chief Health Officer Sonya Bennett said genomic sequencing had linked two cases of the virus on the same floor of the Hotel Grand Chancellor and a doctor at the Princess Alexandra Hospital.The doctor assessed one of the cases in hospital last Wednesday.There are about 160 people quarantining in the Hotel Grand Chancellor.“It was Case 1 that transmitted to both the doctor and Case 3,” Dr Bennett said.Dr Bennett said they will review CCTV to determine how the case was transmitted.“Late last night the whole genomic sequencing confirmed that is likely the case,” Dr Bennett said.“From today there is clearly a lot we don’t yet know and there will be work going on first to manage the public health risk.”Dr Bennett said there were no concerns about the ventilation within the Hotel Grand Chancellor.Dr Bennett said she doesn’t think there is a risk currently in the community saying the fact we haven’t seen any yet is a positive sign.“We all know it’s the UK variant, even within that variant there are differences in the genomicsequencing, so while we’ve seen in Queensland a large number of B117 variants coming into hotel quarantine, they are all slightly different,” she said.“Depending on what we see will inform what our advice will be and I can’t pre-empt that.“Certainly with the healthcare worker in the hospital we haven’t seen any positive cases yet and that is a good sign.”Ms Palaszczuk said she was extremely concerned about the number of cases of the virus being detected in Papua New Guinea. Two of Queensland’s six new cases have come from Papua New Guinea.Ms Palaszczuk said she will speak with the Prime Minister today to discuss how to deal with the country’s second wave.“I understand that they are providing some assistance into Papua New Guinea, but maybe we need to look at a vaccine rollout program there as well,” she said.“It is right on our doorstep and it is a real risk, and as you know that is why we aregetting the Torres Strait Islanders vaccinated as quickly as possible.”Ms Palaszczuk said one in two people in PNG were testing positive and it was a “very serious situation up there”.“Given it is such close proximity, it is something we need to be very serious about it.”Ms Palaszczuk said Australia needed a “co-ordinated response” and she understood the Federal Government was providing assistance with the vaccine rollout.However she said flights from PNG also needed to be assessed.The person was staying on the same floor as another case who is believed to have also transmitted the virus to the doctor at Princess Alexandra Hospital.Deputy chief health officer Sonya Bennett said the matter is only a “potential event.”“What we want to rule out … that there has been any transmission at all in hotel quarantine,” she said.“Because it’s one of a number of possible options to explain the case identified.”
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