Covid 19 Delta outbreak: Family at centre of Birkdale Social Network cluster speak out

A family at the centre of the Birkdale cluster have spoken out after five members were struck down with Covid-19, and they have shared a message for the country to take the virus seriously.

Kelvin*, 56, and his wife Sophia, 49, have been holed up together in the Jet Park quarantine facility in Auckland after both catching the virus.

They are two of the more than 700 cases in the Delta outbreak that sent the country into lockdown.

In the same facility are their two daughters along with Sophia's mother Marion, 81, who have all been infected.

For Kelvin and Sophia's family it all started with a gathering on Sunday, August 15. Their two daughters and two friends were at the family home on Auckland's North Shore for a little celebration.

Less than 48 hours later their worlds were turned upside down.

A flatmate of their two daughters, and one of their partners, was an employee of a Devonport tradesman - Case A in New Zealand's first in the community in six months.

It was also the first in the community of the highly-infectious Delta variant, which has been rampaging across the globe and experts here had warned about for months.

The four in the flat all went to get tested, and that evening found out they were all positive. None had experienced symptoms, and in the days prior had visited locations across the city.

The direction the virus travelled is not yet known, but a wide group of friends and family and even workmates would go on to test positive. The majority of those were under the age of 30.

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This core group, which was announced to the nation the following morning, was taken immediately into the Jet Park facility, as both Kelvin and Sophia, and Marion who had her regular Monday visit from her granddaughters, urgently sought their own tests.

Jet Park Hotel quarantine facility in Māngere, Auckland. Photo / Sylvie Whinray

Sophia and Marion were both positive, but Kelvin's first test came back negative.

Two days later he got a positive result and soon joined his wife at Jet Park.

Kelvin has had one dose of the Pfizer vaccine while his wife has not received any (she was booked in for her first dose this week).

Kelvin, otherwise fit and healthy and someone who rarely gets sick, is wheezing as he speaks.

Every few minutes he stops to cough, a dry and raspy, almost choking cough.

He's never had asthma but his doctor has prescribed him a Pulmicort inhaler - a new treatment normally used for lung disease, but which has been found to reduce Covid symptoms.

Kelvin's found two puffs a day help enormously.

He's constantly taking Paracetamol and Ibuprofen for a pain in his lower back and kidneys that won't go away.

But it's the fevers that are doing his head in.

"It's like a yoyo. I get the shivers so I put something on and then I get too hot, take it off and I am too cold.

"I've never really had the flu so I don't know what to compare it to."

Each day is different too. For Sophia, her experience has been milder, but she's also been nauseous with vomiting and dysentery.

The severity for each of the others and their symptoms have varied.

The couple know several others in the facility, including those associated with their daughters, and friends and relatives of those.

Symptoms among that wider group range from mild to severe, with one - a 29-year-old - even ending up in hospital needing oxygen to help him breathe.

They are part of what has become known as the Birkdale Social Network, which has 74 cases linked to it as of yesterday.

It is the second-largest, behind the Māngere church group at 347 cases.

It is not yet known exactly how the virus spread through the Auckland community, with 15 cases also reaching Wellington (all household contacts linked to the Auckland clusters).

Officials have linked cases in the outbreak genomically to a case in MIQ who arrived from Sydney at the Crowne Plaza from early August.

Jet Park Hotel quarantine facility. Photo / Sylvie Whinray

Yet so far no epidemiological link, a person to person link, has been identified from there.

Marion, for whom the family had the most concern initially due to her age, has ended up having the most mild of symptoms. She had one dose of the vaccine.

She returned a weak positive result and apart from a slight cough and runny nose has had an otherwise relaxed two weeks in quarantine.

"They make us very comfortable, and check in twice a day to make sure I am okay," said Marion.

She even had a microwave delivered so she could reheat her meals as they always arrived too early.

Meanwhile one in their group, a 29-year-old, spent a few days in hospital, at one point needing oxygen to help with his breathing.

"That was a pretty scary moment," says Sophia. "It brought home the severity of the virus."

That person was one of 43 who has ended up in hospital this outbreak, with nine in ICU.

The rate of hospitalisations is double the country's first outbreak last year, a trend consistent with Delta outbreaks overseas, along with how many young people it has affected.

In this outbreak, two-thirds are aged below 34.

Both Kelvin and Sophia went to work in the two days after they were likely infected.

All of their colleagues had been self-isolating and none returned positive test results.

The earliest known possible case to Kelvin and Sophia was Case A. He'd apparently experienced symptoms in the week prior to testing positive, and so too the employee.

One of their daughters started to feel very mild cold-like symptoms near the end of that week, but thought little of it, as most of the country would have at the time, given the number of colds going around.

Sophia, her mother Marion and one of their daughters have all fully recovered now and have left the facility, having spent over 14 days there.

Given the number of contacts they had all generated, the couple say it is "incredible" the outbreak has not been any larger.

"It's just amazing that man got tested when he did and the country went straight into lockdown," says Sophia.

"It could have been so much worse."

*The Herald has omitted their surname to protect the privacy of other family members.