The Australian city of Brisbane has begun a snap three-day lockdown after a cleaner in its hotel quarantine system became infected with the coronavirus.
Health officials said the cleaner had the highly transmissible UK variant and they were afraid it could spread.
Brisbane has seen very few cases of the virus beyond quarantined travellers since Australia's first wave last year.
BBC News reports it is the first known instance of this variant entering the Australian community outside of hotel quarantine.
Australia has reported 28,500 coronavirus infections and 909 deaths since the pandemic began.
By contrast, the US, which is the hardest-hit country, has recorded more than 21 million infections while nearly 362,000 people have died of the disease.
[Source: BBC]
