The Ministry of Health says a daily rise in COVID-19 cases is not unexpected, as it announced 35 new locally-acquired cases of the virus in the community today.
Of the 35 cases, it says 33 are in Auckland and two are located in Wellington. The new caseload brings the total number of cases in the community outbreak to 107.
“All of the cases have or are being transferred safely to a managed isolation facility, under strict infection prevention and control procedures, including the use of full PPE,” the Ministry said.
“As previously indicated, it’s not unexpected to see a rise in daily case numbers at this stage. At its peak last year, New Zealand had a daily total of 89 new cases.”
The total number of community cases in Auckland is now 99 and Wellington’s number of community cases has increased to eight.
Of the 107 cases in the cluster, the Ministry says 72 are already epidemiologically linked to other community cases identified in the outbreak.
“Investigations are continuing to determine whether and how the remaining 35 cases are linked to the outbreak, however most have a plausible link on initial assessment. For example, people were at a location of interest.
“We will continue to release this information and new locations of interest as it becomes available.”
“ESR also continues to run whole genome sequencing on cases. Yesterday 29 samples were sequenced and all were confirmed as being linked to the Auckland outbreak.”
Meanwhile, there were three new cases in recent returnees in managed isolation facilities.
