Friday March 4

Five people with Covid-19 have recently died and today, there are 22,527 new community cases.

Of these cases, there are 515 in Northland, 13,252 in Auckland, 1,674 in Waikato, 1,248 in Bay of Plenty , 464 in Lakes, 325 in Hawke’s Bay, 364 in MidCentral, 79 in Whanganui, 257 in Taranaki, 155 in Tairāwhiti,  69 in Wairarapa, 1,356 in Capital and Coast, 577 in Hutt Valley, 304 in Nelson Marlborough, 1,163 in Canterbury, 63 in South Canterbury, 632 in Southern, 16 in West Coast and 14 in unknown locations. 

There are 152,358 active community cases.

Hospitalisation and deaths

There are 562 people in hospital. Of these, 11 are in ICU or HDU.

Today there are five deaths of people with Covid-19 to report.

A patient with Covid-19 died at Tauranga Hospital yesterday. The person was in hospital for an unrelated condition but had tested positive for the virus.

A patient died at Waikato Hospital yesterday. The person died of an unrelated medical condition and had tested positive for COVID-19.

A person in Dunedin who died of an unrelated medical condition yesterday while receiving palliative care, had tested positive for Covid-19.

Two patients with Covid-19 died in Auckland's Middlemore Hospital - one on March 1 and the other patient on February 27. Both people had unrelated medical conditions and had tested positive for COVID-19.

Boosters

Yesterday, there were 15,195 booster doses administered. To date, 2.4 million people have received a booster dose.

Testing 

More than 130,000 orders were placed through RAT requester site for free Rapid Antigen Tests yesterday, covering more than half a million people, or about 2 million tests. 

The Ministry of Health urges people to remember that priority for Covid-19 response for free RATs is for those who are symptomatic or a household contact.

Please do not order or request RATs from testing centre or collections sites unless you are unwell or a household contact.

If you are symptomatic or a household contact, you can order RATs through the website. 

You, or someone of your behalf, can collect your RAT order from a collection site listed here.

Please only go to those sites that are listed as collection sites.

Top Image: Covid testing station. Photo: Re: News

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