Al-Taqwa College, in Melbourne's outer west, has become the site of a coronavirus cluster which is now linked to more than 100 cases. Principal Omar Hallak says the outbreak was 'out of our hands'. Here's how it unfolded.
"I was trying to follow protocols, hand-cleaning and so on," she said.
"All staff and students have been asked to get tested immediately and have been placed in quarantine while DHHS [Department of Health and Human Services] continues their tracing and the College undergoes a deep clean. In the following three decades, the population of the school swelled to about 2,200 students, as the number of people living in the region quadrupled to more than 200,000."Al-Taqwa College, the main campus of our business entity, has an annual turnover of more than AU$31 million dollars, employs over 300 staff and provides quality education to over 2,200 students," Mohammad Hallak posted on his LinkedIn profile in 2017.
After the school term ended, his wife started hearing through a group chat with parents on WhatsApp that there had been a case linked to the school. He has no concerns about how the school handled the outbreak. He has a daughter in grade one, a son in grade three and twin boys in grade five at Al-Taqwa."It's unfortunately coming from a source outside … and passing on to the teacher."
"Sometimes the first person who develops symptoms is not the first person who's been exposed. So it is tricky in that regard."
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