Botanique on Peel Street confirmed as casual exposure site after brief visit from Newcastle woman

Anyone who visited the Peel Street store on Thursday August 5 from about 9am to 9.05am is considered a casual contact of a confirmed coronavirus case and must isolate until they get a negative test result, unless they have been otherwise instructed by NSW Health.

Owner Drue Daly told the Leader just two people were in the building at the time the confirmed case visited her business, and the visit was very brief.

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Mrs Daly said the case had checked in on paper rather than via a QR code, complicating the reporting process.

"She did all the right things but we only found out today [Tuesday]," she said.

"It was only the two staff members who were in the store at the time."

They were ordered to isolate and get tested before being given more detailed instructions by Hunter New England Health (HNEH) on Tuesday.

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The store was closed on Tuesday and will now be deep cleaned.

Mrs Daly isn't quite breathing a sigh of relief yet.

"I received a couple of thousand dollars worth of flowers this morning that are perishable, that if we don't get test results we'll have to throw away," she said.

Botanique brings the total of Tamworth's potential COVID-19 exposure sites to six.

Anyone who attended the following venues on the specific dates and times identified by public health officials is considered a close contact and must get tested and isolate for two weeks and await further advice from NSW Health:

Anyone who attended the following venues on the specified dates and times is considered a casual contact, unless they have been contacted by NSW Health as close contacts, and must get tested and isolate until a negative test result is received:

On Sunday, Tamworth restaurant The Pig and Tinder Box announced it would close for the foreseeable future after management was told a positive COVID-19 case had attended the venue briefly on Thursday, August 5. It is not listed as an exposure site.

Anyone who travelled on the Armidale-bound XPT train on July 29 is considered a close contact and has been ordered into 14 days' isolation.

The young woman, thought to have been the person who brought COVID-19 to Tamworth last week, visited the city from Newcastle in advance of its lockdown last Thursday.

"I did not break any rules and did the right thing when they announced Newcastle's lockdown and immediately got tested and began isolating," she said, on social media.

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