Waitaki Covid-19 case numbers have remained stubbornly high in recent weeks.
The most recent regional breakdown of Covid-19 cases, released on Friday, showed that Waitaki had 282 active cases of Covid-19, marginally down from 291 the previous week and 297 the week before that.
During that fortnight-long period active cases dropped by 144 in Invercargill, 86 in Central Otago and 373 in Dunedin, while most other centres — apart from Gore, where cases rose slightly — recorded drops.
North End Health Centre owner Andrew Wilson said there was no obvious reason why Waitaki case numbers were high, although cases had now started to be found in aged residential care despite strenuous efforts to keep the disease out.
There were also several large schools and a large freezing works which provided a social environment in which Covid could spread, Dr Wilson said.
"I have seen nine people today with respiratory symptoms. I believe that is in addition to what we would normally be doing, and we have had more than 20 people report positive Rats to us.
"We have opened all those people’s notes, identified the ones we are concerned about and made appropriate phone calls, as per the guidelines, but that has taken an afternoon with three people working part of their time on it.
"If you take that much time out of a day, we are definitely — from a primary care point of view — right in the middle of a pandemic."
Staff were getting tired and work pressure meant it was difficult for them to take scheduled holidays, he said.
"We are appreciative of all the help that the primary health organisation has given us, and we are lucky to have a local hospital that is supporting our local GPs."
Public health officials have regularly suggested that Covid case numbers are under-reported, especially since the switch from PCR testing at clinics to self-testing at home.
However, health officials believe the Waitaki population was extremely diligent at both testing and reporting results.
That high response rate could also be partly due to Covid now affecting an older generation who were more likely to file their test results: a quarter of the district's population is aged over 65.
Yesterday, a further 353 new community cases of Covid-19 were reported in Otago and Southland, a drop which reflected the usual lower
testing report rate over the weekend.
Of the five new deaths of people with Covid-19 reported by the Ministry of Health, none were in southern.
There were 21 people in the region in hospital who had Covid-19.
