News

Gippsland puts on 100 extra COVID cases

ALL of Gippsland’s six municipalities added new cases of COVID-19 in the past 24 hours, pushing the regional total up from 453 on Sunday to 550 on Monday, January 3.

by Michael Giles

Published January 03, 2022

ALL of Gippsland’s six municipalities added new cases of COVID-19 in the past 24 hours, pushing the regional total up from 453 on Sunday to 550 on Monday, January 3.

Where Bass Coast had added 25 new cases on Sunday, it was back to a more modest 4 new cases on Monday but other Gippsland local government areas recorded marked increases as follows:

Bass Coast 115 active cases, 4 new
Baw Baw 97 active cases, 25 new
East Gippsland 40 active cases, 25 new
Latrobe City 157 active cases, 42 new
South Gippsland 84 active cases, 4 new
Wellington 57 active cases, 14 new

South Gippsland is also rising in the COVID ranks in Gippsland, reportedly with 84 active cases including 4 new cases on Monday and 20 new cases reported on Sunday, January 2.

These numbers may be significantly under-reported however with many people turned away from the limited number of testing centres that are open, and anecdotal reports of many more positive cases in the local area.

Today, Monday, January 3, COVID-19 Commander Jeroen Weimar urged only those with symptoms and those who have received a positive RAT test should be attending testing centres at this stage.

At the moment 1:5 people attending testing stations are becoming confirmed positives.

Mr Weimar said that because of the high percentage of positive cases attending PCR testing stations, all of the swabs are being analyzed separately which is taking a longer time.

"Only half of the tests are being returned within two days so we ask people waiting for test results to continue isolating and to be patient," Mr Weimar said today.

The Department of Health website lists the following locations (by postcode) with active cases: