SYDNEY, Australia (AFP) — Sydney’s first local Covid-19 cases in more than a month left health authorities scrambling to trace their origins on Thursday, but they stopped short of ordering Australia’s most populous city into lockdown.
A man in his 50s and his wife have tested positive for the virus, triggering warnings for a string of locations around the city that they visited while believed to be contagious.
They are Sydney’s first recorded cases of transmission outside hotel quarantine since the start of April.
New South Wales state premier Gladys Berejiklian said from 5 pm on Thursday, Sydney’s five million residents would again have to wear masks on public transport and in indoor venues.
“We believe this is a proportionate response to the risk we have ahead of us,” Berejiklian told reporters.
Sewage testing revealed traces of the virus in the city’s inner west.
According to the state’s top health official, genomic testing linked the man’s infection to a returned traveller from the US who had been staying in one of the city’s quarantine hotels.
How the virus leaked into the community is being investigated.
Australia has no widespread community transmission of Covid-19, but has seen several outbreaks emerge from hotel quarantine facilities, causing disruptive city lockdowns.
© Agence France-Presse
