Victorian link in hotel outbreak

GENOMIC sequencing has linked a unique Victorian strain of COVID-19 to Sydney’s Crossroads Hotel outbreak, for the first time revealing the Melbourne virus has spread to NSW.

The genomic sequence “has not been seen before in NSW”, official NSW Health advice stated on Tuesday.

The medical advice, sent to chief health officer Kerry Chant, confirms that laboratory analysis has mapped four of the current NSW cases to Victoria.

The number of cases linked to the pub in southwest Sydney is now 30.

Officials are still investigating the initial source of the Casula hotel outbreak.

It is understood close examination of truck and logistics companies linked to Victoria is being undertaken in a bid to identify patient zero.

The news will increase pressure on Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews over hotel quarantine failings, with the state’s chief health officer, Professor Brett Sutton, saying on Monday it was “conceivable” that all active COVID-19 cases in the state stemmed from the bungle.

The laboratory results will also provide some level of comfort to NSW authorities that the most recent local outbreak is not the result of the state having missed latent community transmission.

The genomic sequencing confirmed that the Victorian strain of the virus had leaked into the border area at Albury, the western Sydney area and possibly Sutherland.

The analysis showed that four NSW cases had the Victorian strain. They were: A MAN from the Blue Mountains who had dinner at the Crossroads hotel on July 3 and had not been to Melbourne;

A MAN who arrived in Sydney with a caravan from Melbourne on July 7; and

TWO Albury border cases — a woman in her 30s who travelled from Melbourne and her family member who had not travelled from Melbourne.

“(They) are part of a new genomic cluster linked to other Victorian cases,” the health advice read. “Other cases linked to the hotel are being sequenced. This would indicate that the Crossroads is most likely linked to Melbourne.”

Victoria recorded 270 new cases of COVID-19 in the 24 hours to Tuesday, and its worst rate of positive tests ever.