Tasmanians have been urged to be aware of scam COVID-19 text messages which inform the recipient that they are a close contact of a positive case.
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The Australian Medical Association's state branch has been made aware of the messages which ask the recipient to click on a link that downloads malware onto their phone.
An official message from Public Health Services contains no link and prompts a recipient identified as a COVID contact to ring the Public Health Hotline.
State president Helen McArdle said the AMA has reported the existence of the text messages to the Health Department.
"People are already anxious, and they get a message saying that they've been identified as a close contact, their immediate reaction would be to panic," she said.
"They would be desperate for more information so if there is a link to click on, it's easy to see that they would do it."
The Australian Medical Association has called for more information to be publicly released on the active COVID cases within Tasmania.
Dr McArdle said the public needed to be made aware of the nature of new COVID-19 cases in the state, such as whether they were imported from other states or were a result of community transmission.
"I've felt information has been a little bit lacking over the past few days ... and there's probably a bit of nervousness about causing too much community concern," she said.
Dr McArdle said it had been pleasing to see that there had been no hospitalisation for COVID-19 in isolation and that exposure at the Royal Hobart Hospital had not led to transmission.
The warning over the scam text message comes after the state recorded 55 new cases of COVID-19 with 23 active cases still under assessment by Public Health.
This took the number of active cases in the state to 300 since borders reopened on December 15.
There are 20 active cases in the North, 46 in the North-West and 156 in the South.
Of the cases, 158 are being managed at home.
Political reporter for Australian Community Media, based in Hobart.
Political reporter for Australian Community Media, based in Hobart.
