Yahoo Lifestyle Coronavirus Victoria: Record number of new virus cases announced
Victoria’s coronavirus crisis shows no signs of slowing down, with the state once again announcing its highest ever daily infections total.
Premier Daniel Andrews confirmed a further 317 cases on Thursday, reminding Victorians the virus is “wildly infectious”.
It is the first time any state has recorded more than 300 cases in a single day since the pandemic began.
In the last seven days, the daily total has surpassed 200 six times, with the state routinely recording numbers never before seen in Australia.
The previous national daily record was Victoria's 288 last Friday, while the highest outside of Victoria was NSW’s 212 on March 28.
Mr Andrews confirmed a further two deaths, taking the state’s death toll to 29.
Both victims are male and aged in their 80s.
The daunting total comes just a day after Chief Health Officer Brett Sutton had suggested daily numbers for the state appeared to be stabilising.
On Thursday, he admitted Victoria “may still not have hit our peak”.
Yet Prof Sutton reassured the state he is confident current restrictions measures implemented in metropolitan Melbourne and the Mitchell Shire will work in controlling the outbreak.
The Al-Taqwa College cluster has now grown to 157 cases, while the Menarock aged care facility in Essendon has risen to 31.
Prof Sutton said there are more than 160 active outbreaks in the state, while there are 2,128 active cases.
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There are 109 people in hospital and 29 in intensive care.
Mr Andrews said more than 28,000 tests were performed on Wednesday and praised those coming forward to get tested.
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Mr Andrews said there was growing evidence in Victoria, the rest of Australia and internationally that testing weeks after infection was still providing positive results.
“People can still have low levels of virus, not particularly infectious, but test positive many weeks after they had initially tested positive,” he said.
Prof Sutton said it was likely “dead virus” being picked up on a genome test like the PCR test.
“That's the point about it being quite a cunning enemy, it's very, very challenging for us to be across every single case and for every single person to do everything they can to limit the likelihood of infecting someone else,” Mr Andrews added.
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