99% of Victoria virus cases associated with quarantine
Virtually all current cases of Covid-19 in Victoria, Australia, can be linked to returned travellers quarantined in the state, an inquiry has heard.
The inquiry also heard guards at quarantine hotels were given "inappropriate" training advice.
Australian media report that guards were told masks and other protection would not be necessary, given that they adhered to 1.5m social distancing.
Victoria is currently in lockdown due to a second wave of infections.
Stricter "stage four" restrictions were set up in the town of Melbourne on 2 August for six weeks.
On Monday, Victoria recorded 25 more deaths and 282 new cases of the virus, rendering it the state's deadliest day since the start of the pandemic.
Towards the end of March, Australia's federal government said everyone time for the united states from abroad would have to enter mandatory quarantine programmes, which will be run by individual states.
Prof Ben Howden, director of the Melbourne-based infectious diseases centre Doherty Institute, told the inquiry into Victoria's hotel quarantine system that genomic sequencing data suggested that at least 99% of cases towards the end of July could be traced to people who had returned after travelling abroad.
However, he didn't especially link the cases to persons in these programmes or even to any particular hotels.
The sequencing viewed 46% of the state's cases up to 23 July, he said, adding that these were "incredibly confident about the accuracy of this clustering".
Barrister Tony Neal QC said the inquiry would try to regulate how the programme was structured and who was simply ultimately responsible for running it, as well as what improvements could be made for future quarantine programmes.
The quarantine programme "fell short of its goal" of avoiding the spread of Covid-19, and for some people in quarantine it had been "not clear who was simply in overall command of the operation", Mr Neal said.
