Health Minister Natasha Fyles is urging members of the Katherine community to get tested after traces of COVID-19 have been detected in wastewater.
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Speaking at a press conference this morning, Ms Fyles announced wastewater tests from November 8 had been positive for COVID-19 in the Bicentennial Rd catchment.
It comes after the testing had come back negative for the previous two days.
"There's no need for residents to be alarmed but they do need to be very careful around their personal health and we're calling on residents of Katherine if they're feeling unwell at all - loss of taste, feeling slightly unwell, headaches fever please reach out to get tested," Ms Fyles said.
She said authorities would be retesting the 12 close contacts of a man who tested positive to the virus in Katherine today as well.
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"So those close contacts we're going to retest them just to make sure that they are still negative and we will of course update once we have those results."
Ms Fyles urged people not to panic and said there were not restrictions planned for Katherine.
"We're not planning any further restrictions in the Katherine region, so people don't need to panic. We're not going to go into a lock out or lockdown.
We have the mask mandate until five o'clock on Friday and the health advice is we don't need any other public health measures at this stage."
She also announced that a defence force worker had tested positive to the virus overnight in a case that is unrelated to the existing cluster.
Ms Fyles said that worker has been in the Bladin Village quarantine facility during his infectious period.
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