There are calls for Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk to apologise for a "traumatic" bungle that led a recently deceased man to be diagnosed with Covid-19 only for an autopsy to reveal he did not have the virus in his system at all.
Nathan Turner, 30, had been named as Australia's youngest ever coronavirus victim when he died on May 26.
His body was found in his home by his fiance Simone Devon. He could not be revived and was declared deceased at the scene. He had underlying health conditions and flu like symptoms.
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A day after his death, Queensland Health stated he had died with Covid-19 in a case that baffled doctors given the state was recording very few new infections and no one else in the town had tested positive.
Health officials scrambled to understand how the virus had reached the town 200kms west of Rockhampton.
Amid fears of an outbreak, hundreds of locals got tested but none were positive. Queensland Health has conceded a coroner's report has now said there was no trace of the virus in Turner's body. But it's not clear what he did died of.
A petition on website Change.org has now been started which demands the Premier and chief health officer Jeanette Young make a "national apology".
"Your leadership created emotional, mental and physical trauma to the loved ones of Nathan, especially his fiance Simone.
"You should be ashamed of yourself and if you had any human decency left then you will apologise for creating trauma to this family," the strongly worded statement said.
• Covid19.govt.nz: The Government's official Covid-19 advisory website
"The emotional, mental, social and physical trauma your chaos caused has broken a family to pieces. A mother and father have lost their son (and) a fiance now struggles to sleep alone without her partner."
At least 2000 people have signed the petition.