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Travellers are being marooned overseas after recovering from COVID-19 due to “outdated” Australian re-entry requirements that have left one Melbourne family in an “insane catch-22” in Fiji.

On Monday, Martina Cullen was forced to say goodbye to her husband and children as they flew home to Melbourne because the Australian government requires her to wait 14 days after her positive PCR test before boarding a plane.

Martina Cullen and husband Nigel Landeryou.

“What I wasn’t prepared for was that the Australian government have kept in place a rule that is no longer valid within Australia,” she said.

Despite being cleared by Fijian authorities, the Melbourne University enrolments manager will remain in Fiji with her nephew after other family members flew home on Monday.

It had already been an eventful holiday, with cancelled flights, lost luggage, a cyclone and the Tongan volcanic eruption, plus a mild bout of COVID-19.

Ms Cullen flew into the Fijian city of Nadi with husband Nigel Landeryou and children Talei, 12, and Liadin, two, and on Christmas Day flew to Savusavu for a family reunion with Nigel’s Fijian-born mother and Australian-born father, who has Parkinson’s disease. Mr Landeryou’s sister’s family were also on the trip.

They all returned to Nadi on January 6 in preparation to return to Melbourne the next day.

But positive PCR tests for some family members arrived on the morning of January 7, forcing the family to skip their afternoon flight and enter hotel quarantine.

The Fijian government released the family on January 12 after they met local requirements.

But the Australian government still requires travellers to wait 14 days after their first positive PCR test if they are shedding, which is when patients have recovered from COVID-19, have no symptoms and are not contagious but continue to test positive.

Martina Cullen and son Talei, 12.

“Myself and my nephew are still shedding the virus but no longer contagious, have been given clearance by the Fijian Ministry of Health,” Ms Cullen said.

But unlike many other countries – and despite changes to what is required within its borders – the Australian government has not reduced the waiting time for travellers to seven days.

“We have followed all the rules we needed to, it’s the disjunct between what happens for re-entry into Australia as opposed to internal requirements.

“The rules just haven’t caught up. I am fit to fly as far as the Fijian government is concerned.”

Two-year-old Liadin Landeryou got her own tent in hotel quarantine in Fiji.

Now Ms Cullen is in limbo at Nadi’s Gateway hotel after spending $15,000.

“We are free to roam around the resort, we have medical clearance from the Ministry of Health on two separate occasions, but the Australian government will not let us in until Wednesday.

“The biggest thing I want to get through is that Australian families are in this predicament around the world, spending thousands of dollars on an antiquated rule that has been updated in most countries.”

Freedom day for Ms Cullen is Wednesday, but a clearance is unlikely to arrive before the morning flight home, so she is resigned to catching a flight on Thursday or Friday.

“It seems absolutely insane that all the rules have changed in almost every single country, but you have to continue to spend insane amounts of money rather than get home when you are completely asymptomatic and have proven that medically,” she said.

A Department of Health spokeswoman said the government regularly reviewed incoming international travellers requirements in light of the available scientific evidence.

“Requirements may change from time to time as a result of these reviews,” the spokeswoman said.

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