Public risk sites will be announced

With a growing number of COVID exposure sites across West Gippsland, the Gippsland Regional Public Health Unit has assured community members that any sites with a risk to community members will be announced.

There has been growing concern via social media posts about new sites not being listed on the Health Department website.

The department confirmed with The Gazette yesterday that it managed a number of exposure sites that were not listed online.

The department said sites were not listed if they represented a very low risk exposure to the community, or if they have comprehensive record keeping and contact tracing measures in place.

However, any tier one exposure sites that pose a community risk will be listed by the department, or its regional health units such as the Gippsland Regional Public Health Unit.

GRPHU provides regular updates of new positive cases and exposure sites across Gippsland.

Due to the current COVID environment in Gippsland, the focus for GRPHU is case management.

The unit is no longer managing exposure sites. Venues that are identified as an exposure site will liaise directly with the department.

GRPHU spokesperson Tracy Vanderzalm explained the classification of sites was based on the assessment of risk.

In determining how to classify a site, health experts will consider the amount of time the positive case spent there.

Ms Vanderzalm said when the department was unable to do all the tracing at a site, whether it be by contact lists, staff lists or people QR coding in, then sites were listed to enable community members to be reached.

In some cases where there has been a positive case, all tracing can be done in house and the site is not publicly listed.

The Trafalgar IGA supermarket was an example of this earlier in the week.

The supermarket closed for deep cleaning, alerted community members as a safeguard and worked closely with the department to establish the contact tracing.

GRPHU confirmed the following day the supermarket was not a public exposure site.

“Thanks to the cooperation and swift response of Trafalgar IGA, the situation was contained early and it was determined there was no, and would be no further risk to public health,” the GRPHU announcement said.

Other businesses around Baw Baw Shire have had similar outcomes and were not listed on the department’s website.

During a recent visit to Lardner Park, COVID-19 Response Commander Jeroen Weimar explained tier one sites were usually classified as high exposure risk because of the length of time a person was at the site, such as a workplace; or, in settings where there may not have been masks worn and shared bathrooms such as a restaurant or gym.

Anyone who has attended a tier one exposure site must be tested as soon as possible and isolate for 14 days from the exposure date.  Other household members must also isolate and be tested if symptoms appear.

Mr Weimar said a tier two exposure site was considered a lower risk of transmission.

He said an example of a tier two site was someone “popping into a Bunnings store for 15 minutes to buy a drill.”

He urged community members to QR code into all settings.

Anyone who has attended a tier two exposure site at the specified times is urged to get a COVID test and stay home until they get a negative result.