Four people have now died of Covid-19 coronavirus in New Zealand after two more deaths in the last 24 hours.
The two latest fatalities were older people who had underlying health conditions, and both were linked to existing Covid-19 clusters.
One was a man in his 80s who died at hospital in Wellington yesterday. He became ill on March 26 and was hospitalised on the 28th.
The woman in her 90s died at Burwood Hospital in Christchurch yesterday after being moved from the Rosewood rest home earlier this week. (Source: Other)
The other death was a man in his 70s who died at Burwood Hospital in Christchurch. As with the woman in her 90s who died yesterday, the man was one of 20 residents transferred from Rosewood Rest home after a cluster formed at the aged care facility.
There are 30 people with Covid-19 at the rest home, including confirmed and probable cases and involving staff and residents. How the cluster at the rest home began is being investigated.
"Due to the underlying vulnerabilities of this group, we cannot rule out further serious illness or deaths within it," Director of Public Health Dr Caroline McElnay said at a media conference today.
"Today's news reinforces the importance of our move to alert level four and the measure we are all taking to limit spread, break the chains of transmission and prevent deaths."
A further 20 residents at Rosewood Rest Home who require hospital level care have been moved to other facilities and have all tested negative to Covid-19.
She also gave an update on cases in New Zealand.
Today there are 29 new cases, made up of 20 confirmed cases and nine probable cases. The national total is 1312.
Fifteen people are in hospital, with five currently in intensive care in Wellington, Auckland's North Shore, Hawke's Bay, Dunedin and Middlemore. One person in Dunedin is in a critical condition.
There are 13 significant clusters in New Zealand, with the largest Auckland's Marist College (85 cases), Matamata St Patrick's Day celebration (85) and a Bluff wedding (70).
"Although we've given those names to those clusters I just want to reiterate that we see cases across the country and those names do not necessarily mean that those cases are all in those places," Dr McElnay said.
She also advised of a new cluster at an aged residential care centre in Christchurch known as the George Manning, as well as two larger Auckland clusters not previously named - one at Spectrum Care for people with intellectual disabilities and another with 35 cases which is linked to a private party.
Dr McElnay said there remains a "clear but declining link to overseas travel" with 40 per cent of cases. Meanwhile, 46 per cent are linked to existing cases, two per cent are community transmission and the remaining 11 per cent are yet to be investigated.
There are 422 people who have recovered from the virus in New Zealand.
So far 58,746 people in New Zealand have been tested for Covid-19, with the seven day average of 3619 a day.
Police have been out doing road checks and following up calls of people breaching lockdown rules, but Dr McElnay said, "I'm hearing that people on the whole have been following rules".
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