Mums reassured as baby at Canberra hospital tests positive to COVID-19

The baby had been in the special care nursery at the Centenary Hospital for Women and Children for some time, and began showing symptoms of coronavirus on Tuesday night.

Canberra Health Services interim chief executive Dave Peffer said there was no known connection between the COVID-19 exposure site and the hospital's birthing suites or maternity wards.

"Canberrans can be assured that this situation is being expertly handled and they can absolutely feel safe to attend hospital should they require that level of care," Mr Peffer said.

"This includes expectant mothers, who can be reassured that the Centenary Hospital for Women and Children continues to be a safe place to have a baby."

Mr Peffer would not disclose the age or health of the child on Wednesday, which he said was to protect the privacy of the family.

Health authorities were working to identify the source of the infection, which was still unknown at the time of reporting.

Mr Peffer said the special care nursery was one of the few places in the hospital where special visitation arrangements were in place.

"We know that parents need to come in each day to potentially feed or provide that close care to the babies," he said.

"And so at this stage, we don't have a known source of transmission."

Following the detection of the virus, the child had been moved to a COVID-19 ward and family members had been sent into quarantine.

Staff and other families who had been at the hospital this week and were classified as high risk were also being contacted and told to isolate.

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The baby was one of 28 new cases of coronavirus recorded in the ACT in the latest reporting period.

Sadly, a woman in her 70s who was receiving end-of-life care at Calvary Haydon Aged Care Facility prior to being diagnosed with COVID-19 has died.

Her death brings the total of lives lost during this outbreak to six.

Of the 28 cases reported on Wednesday, 19 were linked to known cases or ongoing clusters. Eleven were in quarantine for the entirety of their infectious period while at least five were in the community while infectious.

Of those cases, 16 people were in hospital. Eleven of them were unvaccinated and five have had one dose of a COVID vaccine.

The ACT reached two new vaccine milestones on Wednesday, with more than 95 per cent of Canberrans aged 12 and over having had one dose and 66 per cent having received two doses of a COVID vaccine.

ACT Health Minister Rachel Stephen-Smith said the government would invest more than $90 million to the COVID-19 public health response and continue the vaccine rollout, as part of the ACT budget.

"We've worked extremely hard to get as many people vaccinated as possible and we'll continue the rollout until everyone in the ACT who wants to be vaccinated has the opportunity," she said.

Ms Stephen-Smith said until now the internal discussions amongst health authorities had focused on getting to around 90 per cent, with the potential of hitting 92 per cent coverage.

"The fact that we've got to 95 per cent of people aged 12 and over with a first dose vaccination, which means it's pretty likely that they'll get the second dose, is an outstanding outcome for our community," Ms Stephen-Smith said.

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