A marine pilot linked to the Covid-ravaged container ship now berthed off the Bay of Plenty coast has been epidemiologically connected to a taxi driver in Cairns.
The Ministry of Health announced yesterday that 11 crew members out of 21 onboard the Rio de la Plata had tested positive for the Delta variant.
All were asymptomatic when tested.
Queensland officials noted the unvaccinated taxi driver, in his 60s, had been out in the community driving passengers around for 10 days while infectious.
“That taxi driver took the pilot to the airport on the 26th of July and we know through genome sequencing that those two are linked,” Chief Health Officer Jeanette Young said.
“That was before we thought he was infectious which is why he wasn’t picked up on contact tracing, but we’re now going back further.”
But with three new cases confined to the Brisbane cluster, it’s positive news with no confirmed spread from the taxi driver at this stage.
Residents of Cairns and the Aboriginal community of Yarrabah are currently subject to a three-day lockdown, which is due to end on Wednesday if there's no sign of further infections.
At the opposite end of the state, authorities are on alert after communities in northern NSW went into lockdown.
The Byron Shire, Richmond Valley, Lismore and Ballina Shire local government areas went into a snap lockdown on Monday after a positive case from Sydney travelled to Byron Bay.
Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk warned against Queenslanders travelling to the hotspot regions south of the border.
"We do not want to see mass movement happening there at all," she said, flagging an increased police presence at the border.
Chief Medical Officer Jeannette Young said the man was infectious in the community from July 31.
Anyone in Queensland who had been in the affected NSW LGAs was now bound by the same lockdown restrictions.
NSW has reassured Queensland the man who triggered the lockdown was not in the state at any point during his infectious period.
Acorss the state, more than 13000 people are currently in home quarantine.
Test results for all except one of the Tauranga Port workers deemed close contacts of the Rio De La Plata cases have returned negative results, with one person being retested.
The workers came into contact with the Covid-infected crew while unloading cargo off the vessel while berthed in the Port of Tauranga last Wedneday to Saturday.
While the two pilots, one who sailed the Rio de la Plata into port and the other who took it out, have tested negative and will remain in self isolation for 14 days.
According to local health officials, 72 of the port workers boarded the boat while in Tauranga, with the remaining being tested were all on the wharf.
All workers had followed the infection prevention and PPE gear protocols during their duties.
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