MELBOURNE, Australia – Three more people linked to the Australian Open have tested positive for COVID-19 in Melbourne, with 10 more linked to the Grand Slam tennis tournament starting February 8.
Victoria’s emergency services minister Lisa Neville confirmed the new cases had been discovered on Wednesday, adding that the authorities are “ very confident. ” One of the cases is a tennis player who spreads the virus and is not contagious.
The player is already in a hard lockdown because they were on board a flight to Melbourne with another positive. The other two cases are a player and their support person.
Those 10 positives mean a total of 72 players remain in hard lockdown after being considered close contacts of those positives on three charter flights to Melbourne from Abu Dhabi, Doha and Los Angeles.
There were 17 tournament charter flights arriving in Australia for three days last week, allowing players and their entourages to undergo a mandatory 14-day quarantine prior to the tournament.
Australian Open director Craig Tiley said 3,200 tests have been conducted on the more than 1,200 players, support staff and tournament leaders.
“We are on our sixth day and so far the numbers are extremely low and if it’s active business they go straight to the medi hotel,” he told Australian Broadcasting Corp. on Wednesday.
Tiley criticized what he said was a “minority” of players who continue to complain on social media about the conditions in the hotel quarantine.
“Culturally, there is a different approach to how the virus is managed,” he said. “Here in Victoria and Australia we are proud of how we have done it and protected the community as we have. We will continue to do so. “
Tennis Australia has declined to provide The Associated Press with a list of the 72 players affected, but many have made known their status through social media posts.
Australia’s international borders are usually closed, although there are exceptions in special circumstances. All arrivals must undergo mandatory quarantine.
The state of Victoria, with Melbourne as its capital, was responsible for 810 of the 909 deaths in Australia from COVID-19, most of them three months in a deadly second wave that resulted in a curfew and lockdown for the city.