Latest numbers: Cedar Meats outbreak drives another double-digit increase

The coronavirus outbreak at a Melbourne abattoir has again driven new cases in Victoria.

Victoria recorded 14 of the 21 new cases in Australia the past 24 hours.

Thirteen of those cases are linked to the Cedar Meats cluster – seven workers and six “close contacts” to workers.

It takes the total number of cases stemming from that cluster to 62.

There’s now 105 active cases in Victoria, a total that Premier Daniel Andrews described as the envy of regions around the world.

He also revealed Victoria has met the target of 100,000 coronavirus tests in two weeks.

More than 18,000 people were tested yesterday alone.

The Cedar Meats outbreak has prompted criticism of authorities for not closing down the abattoir when the first worker tested positive on April 2.

The government says investigators were told he had not been to the workplace

Chief Health Officer Professor Brett Sutton and Health Minister Jenny Mikakos have stridently defended the handling in recent days, and Mr Andrews today was at pains to point out that Australia’s chief medical officer, Professor Brendan Murphy, had described the state’s handling of the cluster as “a model example of how to deal with an outbreak”.

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