"Sometimes a label falls off a sample," Director-General of Health Dr Ashley Bloomfield says as to why some people in Northland had to be retested for Covid-19 last week.
This morning on Newstalk ZB , Bloomfield downplayed the "error in the system" where there was no record of their test results as not being an alarming issue.
"It does happen occasionally. We had many thousands of people get tested last week in a whole range of centres," he said.
"Every now and then, and it's just usually an error in the system, a small one, it may be just a data entry error, sometimes a label falls off a sample, this happens in hospitals as well, but the important thing is to make sure we find out whether or not the test result is there and if it's not to retest people."
Thousands of people in the community sought tests last week after a person who left managed isolation at Auckland's Pullman Hotel tested positive for Covid-19.
The majority of tests were carried out in Northland after the woman visited several locations in the region between the time she left managed isolation and got her positive test.
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