Quarantine hotel is EVACUATED a day after a two-year-old tested positive to Covid after the little boy ‘spent time in a corridor’
- Entire floor evacuated from Peppers Waymouth Hotel in Adelaide on Friday
- Transfer came after two-year-old boy returned a positive result for Covid-19 test
- Health authorities feared the toddler had spent too long in a hallway during test
An entire floor at an Adelaide quarantine hotel has been moved to a new facility over fears they could have been exposed to Covid-19 after a two-year-old tested positive.
The 18 people were evacuated from the Peppers Waymouth Hotel and taken to the Pullman Hotel on Friday.
South Australia Health said the guests on the same floor were moved because of fears of a possible risk of transmission after a toddler spent longer than expected in a hallway at the hotel while being tested.
A South Australia Health spokesperson said the mother and child ‘may have potentially spread COVID-19 into a corridor as part of the swabbing process’.
Chief Public Health Officer Nicola Spurrier said officials took a look back at the incident and found that the door to the room where the boy’s family was staying had been opened and shut a number of times.
The 18 people were moved from the Peppers Hotel to the Pullman Hotel on Friday after a two-year-old toddler returned a positive test this week
The boy was admitted to hospital on Thursday but later discharged and taken to Adelaide’s Tom’s Court Hotel (pictured), where all people known to have the virus are isolated
She said it had been determined that other people on the same floor could be at ‘significant’ risk.
She said the response taken was part of usual protocols.
‘It’s unfortunate, but we have to deal with these situations in our medi-hotels when we have a positive case,’ she said.
‘These are things that are just not predictable.’
The boy was admitted to hospital on Thursday but later discharged and taken to Adelaide’s Tom’s Court Hotel, where all people known to have the virus are isolated.
However, his mother subsequently tested positive for the virus and was admitted to the Royal Adelaide Hospital along with her son.
SA Health said the delay in testing the boy was related to his distress, identity checks and language barriers while Professor Spurrier said it was always difficult to test very young children.
She said the people moved might be required to start their 14-day quarantine period again, although some might have that period cut short, depending on where their rooms were located and their personal circumstances.
‘I’m most sympathetic and empathetic to those people, but in the interests of public health we have to make these difficult decisions,’ Professor Spurrier said.
Chief Public Health Officer Nicola Spurrier said officials took a look back at the incident and found that the door to the room where the boy’s family was staying had been opened and shut a number of times
All passengers on the plane will be required to undergo two weeks of hotel quarantine at the Pullman Hotel
The floor involved at the Pepper’s Hotel has already undergone a deep clean and would be cleaned a second time on Friday.
The scare comes as South Australia prepared for the arrival on Friday afternoon of about 150 people on board the first direct repatriation flight from India since the lifting of a travel ban.
All passengers on the plane will be required to undergo two weeks of hotel quarantine at the Pullman Hotel.
They will be given a saliva test every day and a swab test on day one, five, nine and 13.
More than 200 Australian children are stuck in India where the coronavirus pandemic continues to rage with thousands of deaths each day.
Desperate parents have been pleading with the government to develop a plan to reunite them with stranded children.
A South Australia Health spokesperson said the mother and child ‘may have potentially spread COVID-19 into a corridor as part of the swabbing process’ (pictured, Peppers Waymouth Hotel)
Foreign affairs officials told a Senate estimates hearing in Canberra there were 209 Australian minors registered to return home.
The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade’s Lynette Wood denied they were unaccompanied minors because most were with family members or guardians.
Senior Labor frontbencher Penny Wong said it would be hard for parents of stranded children to hear an official focus on the term.
‘It’s real people – kids over there, parents here. Think about that instead of quibbling about a category,’ she said.
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