Second case a close contact of Monday victim

CHRISTCHURCH: A second staff member at Christchurch’s Sudima Hotel managed isolation facility, a close coworker of the case announced on Monday, has tested positive for Covid19, the Ministry of Health says.

The ministry said last evening because the person worked at the facility they were being treated as a case of community transmission.

Both cases came into contact with the international fishing crew in quarantine there in the course of their duties, including some of the 31 crew who have tested positive for Covid19.

The person was tested as part of the routine testing for staff in the facility and returned a negative test on Thursday last week.

The ministry said the person was asymptomatic and retested after being identified as being a close work contact of the case reported on Monday and a positive result was received yesterday.

They were in isolation at home and transfer was being arranged to a managed isolation facility, a ministry spokesman said.

At this stage, the ministry believed yesterday’s case had only two close contacts, both household contacts who were being tested and were isolating at home.

The ministry said both cases had limited numbers of contacts and the incident was well contained.

The first of the international fishing crew, who were due to complete their managed isolation yesterday, have had their managed isolation extended for at least a further 48 hours as an additional precautionary measure.

With two cases of Covid19 in the community, there are now questions surrounding what is next for Christchurch.

Experts say it is still too early to think about whether a shift in alert levels is warranted.

Epidemiologist Michael Baker said although there was still a risk these cases could be the start of a chain, or possibly a cluster, the information released so far boded well.

‘‘The universal advice, especially concerning people in Christchurch, is to just pay particular attention on your symptoms.

‘‘Just be very disciplined about staying home and looking after yourself.’’

Another expert was more critical of the Government and said it needed to ‘‘up its game’’.

Professor of public health Nick Wilson called for an urgent review as there appeared to be failures at the border and managed isolation still.

‘‘We’ve had a nurse infected, a maintenance worker, a port worker. These are system failures because we should be stopping all cases at the border.

‘‘Basically we’re having border control failures every two weeks and we could end up with another Auckland August outbreak if we don’t improve.’’

Eminent epidemiologist Sir David Skegg agreed with Prof Wilson’s sentiment.

‘‘It is highly unsatisfactory that we have had six incursions of the virus across our borders in only three months,’’ Sir David said

‘‘No system can be perfect, but we need to face up to the fact that these are failures of infection control.

‘‘How many wakeup calls do we need?’’

He also called for the release of the border controls audit by Heather Simpson and Sir Brian Roche.

Directorgeneral of health Ashley Bloomfield was yet to see the report yesterday, even though it was finalised weeks ago.

Incoming Covid19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins said the SimpsonRoche report would be released.

He also implored New Zealanders to use the NZ Covid Tracer app as it gave officials a ‘‘real head start’’ in community case outbreaks.

He said people had become too complacent and urged everyone to scan QR codes, stay home if sick and wear masks on public transport — even though maskwearing is not mandatory.

There were four new cases reported in managed isolation yesterday. — RNZ/The New Zealand Herald