Sunday 5 September, 1pm
20 new cases today, bringing the total number associated with current community cluster to 801.
Health Director General Dr Ashley Bloomfield and Deputy Prime Minister Grant Robertson gave the 1pm update today. It followed confirmation of the first death linked to the current outbreak - an elderly woman who died in hospital on Friday night. The woman, in her 90s, was a confirmed Covid case and had a number of underlying health conditions.
"I would again just like to personally express my condolences to this woman's loved ones and whānau, and endorse their message in their words 'this is real'. And their recommendation of the importance of following public health advice," Dr Bloomfield said.
New cases today
Dr Bloomfield said with today's new cases, the total number of recovered cases in the outbreak is 79, while the number of active cases is 722.
The continuing decline in new cases showed public health measures, and Auckland's ongoing level 4 lockdown was "rapidly slowing the virus" but it was not over yet, Bloomfield said.
Cases in hospital
The number of people being treated in hospital today is 38 - all in Auckland. Six are in ICU or the high dependency unit, and of those, 4 require ventilation.
Dr Bloomfield also said contact tracing and further investigation into cases continues. Currently, the total number of unlinked cases - that is cases which are not epidemiologically linked or known contacts of existing cases - is 30, down from 58 a week ago. That number is expected to fall in coming days as more work into cases continues.
Details on yesterday's new cases
Of yesterday's 20 new cases, 75 percent were known contacts of cases, and 55 percent were household contacts of cases and were already when they got their positive test.
6 people were also potentially infectious in the community, but had just 6 exposure events. None were in essential worker workplaces, Dr Bloomfield said.
Currently, there are 136 locations associated with cases from the outbreak. The are available on the Ministry of Health website. There have also been no unexpected wastewater detections in the past 24 hours.
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