Amana Living Kinross Centre in Perth’s north closed to visitors after student nurse tests positive to COVID

An aged-care home in Perth’s north has been shut off to visitors after a student nurse tested positive to COVID-19. Amana Living Kinross Care Centre said a worker had tested positive this week. The nurse is now isolated at home and the centre is testing all residents and staff. Visitors who may have come into contact with the nurse are being identified. The scare comes as another Amana Living support worker, who visited clients at home in Perth’s south-east, also tested positive. The second worker is also in isolation and all clients who were visited by the positive case have been contacted. Amana Living said both staff members were wearing masks and had received their COVID vaccinations. The organisation’s chief executive Stephanie Buckland said the health and safety of residents, families and staff was a priority. Ms Buckland also said members of “our specially qualified Infection Control team have been deployed to assist”. “We are working tirelessly to protect residents, clients, their families and staff and to provide the public health authorities with the information they need to assist with contact tracing,” Ms Buckland said. “We have spent the past two years preparing for a potential outbreak, and we are now putting our plans into action. The majority of our staff and residents are triple vaccinated and our procedures are in place to help minimise the impact on our residents, clients, families and staff.” She also said residents were keeping in touch with their families through phone and video calls. The new cases come as the Juniper Cygnet aged-care facility announced five of its elderly residents had recovered from COVID-19. Juniper chief executive Chris Hall also said four staff members had also recovered, reducing the number of infected cases from 14 to nine. Further PCR testing will be undertaken on Friday and all staff members are tested at the beginning of their shifts. On Wednesday it was revealed the Australian Defence Force had been called in to help manage COVID in aged-care facilities.