New Zealand has signed a deal with Spain for 250,000 Covid-19 jabs to come here - enabling New Zealand to keep up significant, or even record, levels of vaccinations, Prime Minister Jacinda says.
"There are now enough vaccines to vaccinate everyone who wants to be at pace. Now it's up to us," Ardern said.
It comes as Director general of health Ashley Bloomfield revealed 13 new Covid cases in the community.
The total in the Delta outbreak is 868 - 264 have recovered.
There are 30 unlinked cases and of the new cases, more than half are linked to the current outbreak.
Of yesterday's cases, six were infectious in the community.
There are 31 people in hospital, including five in ICU or HDU and three requiring ventilation.
There were also two new cases in managed isolation today.
Vaccine deal
The Government has been negotiating with manufacturer Pfizer and a number of countries to get extra vaccine supplies.
Before lockdown the rollout had intended to vaccinate about 50,000 people a day by this point, but surging demand amid the Delta outbreak this had risen to 80,000 to 90,000 some days, averaging more than 500,000 a week.
With the bulk of supplies arriving next month, the Government risked having to slow the rollout to avoid running out of vaccines, so instead sought a deal with partner countries.
Ardern said new supplies would help maintain and build on the rollout.
An agreement with Spain has been reached for it to supply New Zealand with more than 250,000 doses.
They left Madrid at 1am today, and will arrive in New Zealand tomorrow morning.
"With this supply we will be able to continue our rollout at record levels."
Ardern has a good relationship with Spain PM Pedro Sánchez Pérez-Castejón and has met him on several occasions, including at the UN leaders meeting in New York in 2019.
The shipment will mean that the supply level will buy at least another week before they might run dry before larger shipments of the Pfizer vaccine are expected in October.
She thanked New Zealanders for going to get vaccines. "What I find really heartening is that 64 per cent of people aged 12 plus have had at least one dose."
"Auckland is into its fourth long week of a level 4 lockdown. The rest of the country is having to adapt to a new level 2."
She said the rules were "gruelling" and that was why as many people as possible should be vaccinated.
"I hate the idea of even one preventable death. If everyone who can be vaccinated is vaccinated, you will be saving the life of someone who can't be."
She said that included young children, who could not be vaccinated.
She said business owners should be supporting their workforces to get vaccinated, as could sport and church leaders.
She said 121 of the recent cases were under nine years old.
"They can't be vaccinated so they need us to be. All of us."
Ardern said NZ expected to receive a total of 1.8 million doses from Pfizer throughout the month of September, in addition to the doses purchased from Spain.
"This means we don't have any plans to slow down the rollout.
"This is the result of excellent collaboration between officials from New Zealand, Spain, the European Commission and Pfizer to secure this agreement. I wish to say thank you to those involved especially President Pedro Sánchez of Spain."
More than 17,000 tests were given yesterday and more than 8000 in Auckland. Bloomfield said that was helping giving the confidence the spread was restrained.
Eighty-seven percent of 38,126 contacts had now been tested.
Staff were continuing to come from around the country to help Auckland's hospitals, including ICU staff.
On the Auckland Middlemore case, day three test results from 124 patients and 29 staff had returned negative results. All were still in isolation.
Bloomfield encouraged businesses to display QR codes so they were accessible to those in wheelchairs.
Close to 1.6 million people scanned in yesterday, the first day of level 2 outside of Auckland.
Ardern said there was solid progress, but urged people to keep getting tested, to follow the rules and keep scanning.
"We need to test, test, test."
Ardern said, "If you give Delta an inch it will take a mile."
