Worrying traces of coronavirus have been found in sewage catchments in regional New South Wales despite the country towns reporting no cases of Covid-19.
Fragments of the virus have been detected in sewage tests in the state’s west, in Molong, Hunter New England and Armidale more than 480km from the outbreak in Greater Sydney.
Traces have also been discovered on the northern Central Coast and Wollongong.
NSW Deputy Chief Health Officer Jeremy McAnulty made the announcement during the Covid update on Sunday and issued a warning to residents in those areas.
‘People in those areas please come forward for testing with the mildest of symptoms,’ he said.
The Western Local Health District said a sample was tested near Orange last Monday and came back positive on Wednesday.
NSW Health on Wednesday night issued an alert for the sewage treatment plant in Molong, which services around 1700 people in the state’s Central West.
Officials said they were aware of a positive case of Covid-19 in the area, however the infected person lived outside the catchment of the treatment plant.
The warning came only hours after Central West communities were released from a snap seven-day lockdown after a Cabonne Shire Council resident tested positive.
The man, the region’s only case to date, caught the virus from a truck driver who had travelled from Greater Sydney earlier in July.
More to come.
