Nine new confirmed cases of Covid-19 were reported today, all from the Auckland cluster.
Healthcare workers have spoken about what it is like inside Victoria's facilities that have been hit hardest by the Covid-19 crisis and revealed a confounding aspect of the new disease.
Coronavirus infections continue to rise in aged care settings, with the government sending in frontline workers to help staff deal with the growing outbreaks.
Sam Bates, a research nurse unit manager for Sunshine and Footscray Hospital intensive care units, said both facilities had been at full capacity over the past few days.
"We're seeing some really young patients. We've had a 26-year-old. A 35-year-old. This has got no limit to the age of people that this virus will attack and hit," she told the ABC's 7.30 report.
"But I think what's most concerning is that we're seeing clusters in family groups. It will pick and choose which person in that household will be the sickest and needs to come to intensive care. There's no rhyme or reason to it. It just happens. And I think that's been quite disturbing. Really distressing to see."
Dr Jesse Zanker is one of the frontline workers who have been battling the Covid-19 outbreak in aged care homes. Photo / ABC
Geriatrician Dr Jesse Zanker was sent into one of the hardest hit facilities in Melbourne's west, where almost the majority of residents were infected with coronavirus.
Zanker told the programme staff were overwhelmed, with nurses often receiving no handover or updates on patient's situations before beginning their shifts.
"The night has fallen and unfortunately so has our faith in the world. It's been a pretty rough night here at the facility we're just leaving," he said at the end of one shift.
"We had multiple palliative conversations and tearful nurses having received no handover — coming into patients or residents that are approaching end of life without supports in place."
Zanker said for many residents it wasn't respiratory symptoms that were impacting them the most, it was their "overall function".
He found that using words like "death" and "dying" brought clarity to the families of patients as they often hadn't been told about the reality of the situation before that point.
"In each conversation I found that the loved ones that I was speaking to were and have been expecting the worst. They hear the figures. They hear the mortality rates and hear these horrible stories," he told the programme.
"For many of these families there is relief. Use of the difficult words like dying and death as these make real what is occurring for their loved one when often until this point, clarity of information has been really difficult to obtain."
Zanker said the doctors and nurses who had been thrown into working at these aged care facilities were often "distressed" by the circumstances they found themselves in.
"At times, we're significantly distressed and exasperated at the circumstances in which we've found ourselves, where we are unable to provide the optimal care that we sought for a multitude of reasons."
Shane Durance and Dr Zanker tend to a patient. Photo / ABC
Clinical nursing consultant Shane Durance told 7.30 that the staff were working extremely hard but many were going in without being given key knowledge, such as the layout of the facility, being unfamiliar with the equipment and systems in place, as well as the history of patients.
"Tonight I worked with three nurses who were all in tears at one stage or another. Including myself. Basically because they want to be able to do more and can't," he said.
"I know they're going to go home tonight and think they haven't done enough. I've been working since 1976 and I can tell you they've done everything they can. So be kind to them."
