Gastro cases have been continuing to crop up at a popular Queensland campground, which has a long history of similar problems.
The Courier Mail reports that Inskip Point on the Cooloola Coast will remain open in the lead-up to Christmas holidays despite a recent case in which three out of a group of four campers suffered ‘explosive vomiting and diarrhoea’.
The newspaper says the group was staying at the Sarawak campgrounds at the end of last month when illness struck.
The Courier Mail says the group were approached by park rangers early on the second day of their trip who let them know there had been a gastro outbreak but ‘not to worry as there had only been one person affected’.
Gastro can quickly pass form one person to another.
Despite being ‘super diligent’, a male member of the group then became violently ill.
They packed up and went home to Brisbane the next morning, but another two members of the group also became sick soon afterwards.
A state government spokesperson told the Courier Mail that all campsites at Inskip Point remained open and the only four gastro cases had been recorded in the whole of 2022, three of them in the first half of the year.
“Following the reports, rangers conducted a deep clean of the facilities and provided advice and education to campers,” the spokesperson said, adding that rangers routinely deep clean the park’s facilities and give health advice to campers.
Multiple campsites were closed at Inskip Point at the end of 2021 following a series of severe gastro outbreaks, but the spokesperson said the measures in place had been successful as no camping areas had been closed due to illness since.
Gastroenteritis is highly infectious and can be passed from person to person very easily.
The spokesperson told the Courier Mail that people preparing to camp at Inskip ‘are reminded to make personal hygiene their top priority by packing plenty of soap and freshwater and their own personal hand towels in their camping kit’.
“Hands should be thoroughly washed with soap and clean running water after using bathroom facilities and before preparing food,” he told the paper. “Campers are also encouraged to bring their own portable toilet to Inskip Point camping areas.”
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They should be testing the sea water, because everybody swims, AND IT COULD COME FROM THERE.
It comes from human waste … not the sea.
Thirty-five year’s ago there were no public toilets or running water there, so what do you think they we’re doing when it came to the toilet?
We also contracted gastro from the West Sarawak campsite. We were there on the 26th and 27th of October. My husband was ill for 3 days from the day we left and then it started for me two days later. Not a nice way to spend our 3 days in Toowoomba. No rangers spoke to us about gastro outbreaks.
Obviously the area is seen as a cash cow and packed like a cattle feedlot. It’s disgusting considering the amount of untreated human waste each day entering the environment. What type of individual would willingly visit such a contaminated area let alone camp there, also what type of individual has to be reminded of basic personal hygiene after defecating then preparing lunch.