COVID response 'rapid' and highest risk contained from positive Hobart case, Premier Peter Gutwein says

The 38 primary close contacts, including airline passengers on JQ715, all people in the two households the man visited and airport staff and visitors, have been quarantined and seven tests have come back negative so far.

The negative tests included two students at East Derwent Primary School who were at one of the houses, and two students from Blackmans Bay Primary School who were on the flight.

A further 16 casual contacts who were involved in transporting the man or were present at the airport are also in quarantine, and a further 16 people have been identified as potential casual contacts, also in quarantine.

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Premier Peter Gutwein said the contact tracing identified relevant contacts within six hours, compared with the national standard of 48 hours.

Director of Public Health Mark Veitch said this response meant the risk of the virus spreading in the community was greatly reduced.

"This response has been rapid, I believe it's thorough, and we've contained the highest risk people associated with this case and their movement into Tasmania," he said.

"People take a day or two to become infectious if they do become infectious.

"The fact that these people who were close contacts were identified very quickly and put into quarantine before they could pose a risk to the community, that's what quarantine is for."

Dr Veitch said that a second possible case was likely - similar to his expectation with the recent Newnham case, which did not eventuate - but that it would not be a risk to the community.

"There's a good chance that one of these close contacts of this case may become a case themselves," he said.

The 31-year-old man had been refused a G2G PASS on September 29 and October 1.

He had been in a high risk level 1 area in both NSW and Victoria, and he provided a NSW address as his place of residence.

Tasmania Police Assistant Commissioner Donna Adams said his application was rejected due to a lack of detail.

"[He] sought to travel to Tasmania stating he was relocating [but] did not provide sufficient evidence to validate claim," she said.

"On that basis he was rejected."

Mr Gutwein said Tasmania had limited power to prevent people without a valid G2G PASS from arriving at the state's airports.

"We have had people at airports informing them not to come if they don't have valid G2G passes," he said.

"We initially spoke to the airlines to see if they could manage the circumstances, they declined.

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"Tasmania's laws stretch to our boundaries. We have no valid laws we can apply at Melbourne or Sydney or any other airport [not in Tasmania]."

The man arrived at Hobart Airport at 8.30pm on Monday, but there were no more return flights until the next day meaning he was taken to the Travelodge Hotel to quarantine in the meantime. He left the hotel, however, which was not detected on CCTV.

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He was picked up by a single person and driven to a house in Hobart's outer north, then caught by police about 4.45pm on Tuesday.

Mr Gutwein said he was confident the Travelodge could continue as a hotel quarantine site, subject to a review of the latest case.

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