4 cases of Covid-19 in managed isolation, one historical

Ministry of Health update

March 9, 2021
There are four new positive cases of Covid-19 in managed isolation to report today. One of the four is historical and deemed not infectious.

There are no new cases in the community.

March air crew case
Contacts of the air crew member who tested positive for Covid-19 on Sunday are being advised by public health staff of the steps they need to take. This case has a limited number of contacts and is considered to have been infectious while Auckland was in Alert Level 3. Therefore, the wider public health risk is low.

All test results received from the air crew have returned negative results, with one still outstanding. More than half the remaining contacts have returned negative tests and all 35 contacts from the vaccination centre have been contacted and given public health advice.

The crew member remains in Auckland’s quarantine facility. Their household contacts have tested negative and remain in isolation at home as a precaution.

Whole genome sequencing of the air crew member has identified the B.1.1.317 variant of the virus. Unlike other variants, including those first identified in the UK and South Africa, this variant is not currently classified as a variant of concern.

As always, at this stage in the investigation, a range of possible infection sources are being looked into.

Up-to-date information on testing locations in metro Auckland
There are 7 community testing locations available in Auckland today. These are in Wiri, Otara, Pakuranga Heights, Balmoral, New Lynn, Henderson and Northcote.

For up-to-date information on testing locations in Auckland, visit https://www.arphs.health.nz/h and all testing locations nationwide, visit the Healthpoint website.

Today is a significant milestone for the Northern Region – three metro Auckland DHBs and Northland DHB – with the one millionth Covid-19 tests recorded overnight. Testing has played a pivotal role in protecting our border and managing Covid-19 outbreaks in the region. Thank you to everyone in Northland and Auckland who is involved in testing – including in our community testing centres, primary care providers, urgent care clinics, MIQ facilities and laboratories.

Thank you also to everyone in Northland and Auckland who has responded to the call to be tested over the past year. In Auckland more than 110,000 tests have been completed since February 14 in response to the most recent outbreak.

New border case details

*This case is considered historical and not deemed to be infectious. This person was in Auckland’s quarantine facility at the time but has subsequently been released.

The total number of active cases in New Zealand is 79. Our total number of confirmed cases is 2409.

The total number of tests processed by laboratories to date is 1,786,704.

On Monday, 3526 tests were processed. The seven-day rolling average up to yesterday is 9,399 tests processed.

Historical cases
Since January 1, there have now been 37 historical cases, out of a total of 242 cases.

NZ Covid Tracer
NZ Covid Tracer now has 2,742,498 registered users.

Poster scans have reached 212,968,561 and users have created 8,317,151 manual diary entries. There have been 979,598 scans in the last 24 hours. This is 454,254 less scans than yesterday and the Ministry of Health urges New Zealanders to keep scanning in.

It’s critical to keep track of where you’ve been and the Covid Tracer app is an easy way to do this. Please continue to scan QR codes wherever you go and turn on Bluetooth tracing in the app dashboard if you haven’t already done so.