NSW health authorities are working to determine the source of two recent COVID-19 cases linked to a pub in southwest Sydney.
Health Minister Brad Hazzard on July 10 said a new case - a man in his 50s - had been at the Crossroads Hotel in Casula on July 3, the same night as an earlier case.
“That has major ramifications because that appears to be ... a likely point of connection where the two people could have actually come into some contact at least with the virus,” Hazzard told reporters.
Anyone who attended the hotel last Friday is now being asked to self-isolate and come forward for testing immediately if they develop even the mildest symptoms.
NSW Chief Health Officer Kerry Chant said they were looking to determine the source who potentially infected both people at the hotel.
The Crossroads Hotel has closed for deep cleaning, with contact tracing under way and a pop-up testing facility set up in the venue’s car park.
Hazzard said another troubling case to emerge on Friday was a man in his 20s from Melbourne, who had towed his caravan up from Victoria on July 7.
The health minister asked people who had “ducked out of Melbourne” just before or after new public health orders to consider “packing up your caravan, packing up your tent or whatever else you’ve got and head home to Victoria”.
“Your government has put in place some very strict guidelines and rules. It’s not helpful for you to be out of that environment if you’ve been in that environment,” Hazzard said.
The man, who reported minimal contact with anyone in NSW apart from his partner and two friends, is in hotel isolation. His three contacts are in quarantine, with his partner testing negative to the virus.
NSW had publicly recorded 14 other COVID-19 cases as of Friday, with all but one in hotel quarantine.
The other was linked to two previous cases in the NSW-Victoria border town of Albury.
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