There are 22,152 new cases of Covid-19 to report in the community today and 578 in the Southern DHB region.
Today's figures provided by the Ministry of Health show there are now 5390 active cases in the South.
Covid-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins this afternoon gave the latest update on the Omicron outbreak, saying there were now more than 120,000 active Covid cases nationwide.
However, he said the key metric now is those requiring hospitalisation: "New Zealand at this point continues to experience fewer people in hospital than we've seen internationally and one of the key drivers of that is the millions of Kiwis who have been vaccinated and who have had booster doses."
There are 405 people in hospitals, including 10 in intensive care. One person is in hospital in the Southern area.
Location of new community cases (PCR & RAT): Northland (382), Auckland (13,231), Waikato (2,139), Bay of Plenty (1,270), Lakes (415), Hawke’s Bay (273), MidCentral (367), Whanganui (56), Taranaki (261), Tairāwhiti (137), Wairarapa (91), Capital and Coast (1,115), Hutt Valley (473), Nelson Marlborough (272), Canterbury (1,033), South Canterbury (36), Southern (578), West Coast (15); Unknown (8).
There are now 123,836 active cases nationwide.
Eight new cases were identified at the border today.
PCR test delays
Director-General of Health Dr Ashley Bloomfield yesterday made an apology over delays to people receiving PCR test results in the past week, with a backlog from last Wednesday only beginning to clear in the past couple of days.
Opposition parties criticised Bloomfield, saying he misled the public over testing capacity, and the ACT Party calling for him to be removed.
Asked about the overestimation of testing capacity, Hipkins said today that Bloomfield spoke about it at length yesterday, and the information the Government was drawing on came from the Ministry of Health.
"I think he's acknowledged that they didn't get that right. What the Government has had right the way through the response are quite regular reviews of the advice that we've been getting from the Ministry of Health including a technical expert advisory group on the issue of testing.
"It's clear in this case that the advice that they provided to us and to the public didn't stack up in terms of what the labs were ultimately able to deliver.
"We get quite a range of advice coming in and there's all sorts of motivations for that sometimes. The critical thing for us now is that we want to make sure the rollout of rapid antigen tests is as smooth as possible and that remaining backlog is cleared within the next few days."
He said he did not want Bloomfield to resign over the error.
The Ministry of Health had been "probably the most scrutinised entity in the entirety of the Covid-19 response", Hipkins said, and at last count there had been about 1600 recommendations made over the reviews of the Ministry's advice.
MIQ changes, staff acknowledged
Cabinet will make decisions in the next week or two about the future of managed isolation and quarantine, Hipkins said today.
From this afternoon, MIQ will return to the previous self-service model for the allocation of rooms. This applies for unvaccinated people but they should not have difficulty with it because the demand will be much lower, he said.
"New Zealand has been very fortunate in the sense that we have had a very low mortality rate and a very low case rate and that is because of the hard work of the people that have been working at our border and have been working in our managed isolation facilities.
"And as many of them find that work is coming to an end, I want to acknowledge once again the personal toll that has taken.
"As Minister for Covid-19 Response, MIQ has been one of the most difficult parts of this job for me over the last 18 months and it has involved hearing from workers the sort of thing that they have been subject to including personal abuse. They've often been ostracised in their communities, excluded from sports clubs, abused in public, and they have continued to go to work every day to keep the country safe."
He said he also assured them they will be treated fairly as MIQ begins to wind up.
He also acknowledged the New Zealanders who have wanted to return to the country but have been unable to, as well as those who aren't New Zealanders but have friends and family here and have wanted to visit them.
"My message to them is ... not long to wait now, and haere mai."
On the sports field
On school sports and school activities, Hipkins says more detail will be provided soon, but young people who are participating in a school-organised activity do not need to be vaccinated, including sports teams competing against other sports teams.
"If it is organised by the school, then vaccination is not required. That of course does not apply to adults who are coming to spectate or coming to support those school activities - the same requirements that have been in place will continue to apply to them."
Hipkins said the Government had seen evidence that some of the rules around schools and sporting activities have been interpreted very narrowly, such as games being stopped bang on 3pm when school ends for the day, when there is no harm in the same players continuing to play.
The Minister said the rules are being changed to make them much clearer. He acknowledged there will be more cases seen in schools and early learning centres, and urged parents whose children get symptoms to keep their children at home.
Vaccination and testing
Hipkins says 86 percent of the eligible population aged 5+ has now received at least one dose, with 80 percent fully vaccinated. As of midnight, 2,390,659 had received a booster - about 79 percent of the eligible population.
Some 243,244 children have received a paediatric dose - about 51 percent.
Hipkins says the high rates are making a difference, and urges people who are eligible but have not yet had a dose to take up the opportunity.
He says we have 80.8 percent of ICU or high-dependency unit beds in use, 64.5 percent of ward beds occupied, and 13.9 percent of ventilators in use.
"Covid-19 only makes up a very small fraction of those numbers and so there is still capacity there to respond to increasing case numbers," he says.
Some 51,794 people have self-reported RAT test results through the online portal, he says. He urges people to be patient while trying to access testing, as there is a lot of demand.
He says there is no need to stock up on rapid antigen tests.
"Two million arrived last night, another five million this morning, they are literally arriving all of the time," he says.
They do also expire, becoming less accurate as they get older, "so we don't want people stockpiling". He says there will be plenty to go round.
- RNZ and ODT Online
