Dr Ashley Bloomfield says he's honoured to have led the Ministry of Health through the Covid-19 pandemic.
The director-general of health is stepping down from the role this week and made the comments during his last media briefing this afternoon.
He was joined by Public Health Agency's Deputy Director-General Andrew Old and Te Whatu Ora Health New Zealand's interim national medical director Dr Pete Watson.
There are 8730 new community cases of Covid-19 to report today and 808 people in hospital. The total number of people who have died with Covid is now 1427.
Bloomfield today thanked the media for having played an important role in keeping the public informed.
A great part of New Zealand's success in dealing with Covid was how communities responded to the information provided, he said.
"Our biggest healthcare force is our citizens."
He thanked those who were taking steps to protect themselves and their family, particularly through logging test results and isolating when ill.
In three regions last week, hospitalisations have levelled off and the BA.5 variant now made up 61 per cent of the country's Covid cases, he said. Health officials expected it would fully take over by the end of next month.
Bloomfield said modelling suggested that daily cases were likely to peak around 12,000.
"Hospitalisations tend to track a week behind cases and we have seen cases dropping."
The worse-case scenario outlined by modellers a few weeks ago was now "highly unlikely", he said. However, we would continue to see significant Covid deaths until cases drop.
People who were not fully vaccinated were six times more likely to die from Covid, Bloomfield said, adding that getting boosted was vital.
Half of the Covid-related deaths of people between the ages of 20 and 60 could have been avoided if they were boosted, he said.
Dr Watson said authorities are working hard to address the increased pressure on hospitals due to Covid and other winter illnesses. He expected that pressure to continue for months.
Watson said there is a winter illness plan in place for hospitals. As of tomorrow, more than 400 pharmacies will be able to start supplying over-the-counter Covid medication.
Bloomfield finishes in the role on Friday and on Saturday was looking forward to "a jolly good break."
No new monkeypox cases
Asked about monkeypox, Andrew Old said there were no new confirmed cases in New Zealand.
"Unfortunately global cases are starting to rise." That included 40 cases in Australia, Old said.
Health officials were working through the WHO list of recommendations to ensure New Zealand remained in the best position to minimise an outbreak here.
Old said authorities have been working on plans since the beginning of the outbreak in May.
More cases in New Zealand were "certainly" expected, and officials were working with Pharmac to secure a supply of a vaccine for monkeypox.
14 authorities told to fluoridate water
Bloomfield has today written to 14 authorities instructing them to fluoridate their water and this would take anywhere between six months and three years to ensure this happened.
"I've been a long term champion of fluoridation," Bloomfield said.
"I would encourage those councils and those ones I haven't directed to fluoridate their water as soon as possible - they don't need to wait for direction."
