Deputy Chief Health Officer Dr Chris Lease held a press conference this afternoon revealing the new result and urging South Australians with any symptoms to get tested.
The positive result was detected in a catchment servicing around 12,000 people near Adelaide’s CBD, taking in the Pullman Hotel which is currently being used as a medi-hotel.
“The wastewater system of testing is very much an early warning system,” Dr Lease said.
“Ideally we might be able to perhaps assign this to an old case, but we have to be very vigilant at this stage.”
The high level of virus detected in the wastewater was causing authorities concern.
It would be the first time that the state had detected such “a strong signal like this” in its wastewater from an old infection, he said.
Dr Lease also expressed concern over testing rates, noting that only around 30 per cent of South Australians who develop COVID-19 symptoms are getting tested.
Further sampling was now underway with results expected tomorrow.
This content first appear on 9news