MELBOURNE, Australia – Three more people linked to the Australian Open tested positive for COVID-19 in Melbourne, which increased to ten people linked to the Grand Slam tennis tournament starting on 8 February.
Victoria Neville, Victoria’s emergency services minister, confirmed that the new cases were detected on Wednesday, adding that authorities were “very confident”. One of the cases is a tennis player who spills the virus and is not contagious.
The player is already in a tough exclusion because he was on board a flight to Melbourne with another positive case. The other two cases are a player and their support person.
The ten positive cases mean that a total of 72 players remain in a hard closing time after being considered as close contact of the positive persons on three charter flights from Abu Dhabi, Doha and Los Angeles to Melbourne.
There were 17 tournament flights that arrived in Australia three days last week, allowing players and their entourage to undergo a mandatory 14-day pre-tournament quarantine.
Australian Open director Craig Tiley said 3,200 tests had been done on the more than 1,200 players, support staff and tournament officials.
“We are on our sixth day and so far the numbers have been extremely low, and if it’s active business, they’re going straight to the media hotel,” he told Australian Broadcasting Corp. on Wednesday.
Tiley has criticized what he says is a “minority” of players who still complain about the conditions in hotel quarantine on social media.
“Culturally, there is a different approach to dealing with the virus,” he said. “We are proud here in Victoria and Australia of how we have done this and protected the community as we have. We will continue to do so. ”
Tennis Australia has refused to provide a list of the 72 players affected to The Associated Press, but many have made their status known via social media posts.
Australia’s international borders are mostly closed, although there are exemptions in special circumstances. All arrivals must do compulsory quarantine.
The state of Victoria, which is the capital of Melbourne, accounted for 810 of Australia’s 909 deaths due to COVID-19, most of which resulted in a deadly second wave three months ago, leading to stagnation and stagnation for the city.