A male childcare worker charged with over 70 alleged child sex offences as 1,200 children are urged to get tested for infectious diseases.
Joshua Brown, 26, was arrested on May 12 and charged with a slew of offences relating to eight alleged victims between the ages of two months and five-years-old.
The alleged victims attended a daycare centre in Point Cook, in Melbourne’s southwest, between April 2022 and January 2023.
Brown was employed at 20 childcare centres over an eight-year period between January 2017 and May 2025.
The charges include the sexual penetration of a child, production of child abuse material, and attempted sexual penetration of a child under 12.
While Brown’s alleged offending is limited to one daycare centre, children who attended any of the centres while he was employed will be contacted by police.
Detectives are also investigating alleged offending at a second childcare centre in Essendon, in the city’s inner-northwest, ‘as a priority’.
Up to 1,200 children have been recommended by health authorities to undergo testing for infectious diseases due to a potential exposure risk.
Chief Health Officer Christian McGrath said the testing process was expected to take ‘days to weeks’ and that infected children could be treated with antibiotics.
Up to 1,200 children have been urged to get tested for infectious diseases after a 26-year-old childcare worker was charged with over 70 alleged child sex offences (stock)
Creative Garden Early Learning Point Cook, one of the impacted centres, is pictured
He said health authorities were confident that those who had not been contacted will not need to undergo any testing.
Families who have not been contacted by authorities, but are worried, can call a dedicated advice hotline that has been set-up for families.
The hotline is 1800 791 241, and it is open seven days a week from 8am to 9pm on weekdays and 8am to 5pm on weekends.
Victorian Premier Jacinta Allen said she was ‘sickened by these allegations of abuse’.
‘They are shocking and distressing, it is every parent’s worse nightmare,’ she said.
‘Families across Victoria will be horrified, angry and, frightened.’
Brown has remained in custody since his arrest in mid-May and is scheduled to appear at Melbourne Magistrates’ Court on September 15.
He had a valid working with children check, which has since been cancelled.
The full list of the 20 childcare centres Mr Brown worked out between January 2018 and May 2025 has been released ‘out of an abundance of caution’.
