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18,699 new Covid-19 cases in New Zealand, 7 deaths

March 12, 2022

A health worker hands out rapid antigen tests in Henderson, Auckland. (Source: Getty)

There are 18,699 new Covid-19 cases in New Zealand on Saturday, with the Ministry of Health also announcing seven new deaths.

The cases, detected through rapid antigen tests (RAT) and PCR tests, are located in Northland (670), Auckland (6077), Waikato (1700), Bay of Plenty (1,247), Lakes (496), Hawke’s Bay (730), MidCentral (667), Whanganui (162), Taranaki (462), Tairāwhiti (377), Wairarapa (169), Capital and Coast (1,545), Hutt Valley (937), Nelson Marlborough (424), Canterbury (2,028), South Canterbury (118), Southern (848), and West Coast (32), with 10 unknown.

There are now 206,288 active cases in the community with the number of confirmed cases now at 346, 621.

There are 853 people in hospital with 17 cases in ICU or HDU.

Sixteen cases were also detected at the border.

Of the 853 cases in hospital, 19 are in Northland, North Shore (172), Middlemore (199), Auckland (208), Waikato (69), Bay of Plenty (28), Lakes (12), Tairāwhiti (three), Hawke’s Bay (23), Taranaki (10), MidCentral (18), Whanganui (two), Hutt Valley (19), Capital and Coast (33), Wairarapa (five), Nelson Marlborough (three), Canterbury (22), and eight in Southern.

The average age of current hospitalisations is 59.

There were seven deaths of people with Covid-19, taking the total in New Zealand to 105.

Three of the deaths occurred in Auckland, and one each in Bay of Plenty, MidCentral, Wellington and Canterbury.

One person was in their fifties, two were in their 70s, two were in their 80s, and two were in their 90s. Four were male and three were female.

In Saturday's release, the Ministry of Health also noted the change in isolation period for those with Covid-19 from 10 days to seven, as of 11.59pm on Friday.

"You do not need to be retested after your initial positive result. If you still have symptoms after seven days, stay home until you feel better and then wait another 24 hours," the ministry said.

"If you are a household contact and return a positive RAT result while isolating, you will need to isolate for a further seven days and wait until 24 hours after you are symptom-free.

"Other household members do not have to reset their isolation and can leave isolation on day eight, the same day as the first case can leave isolation, provided they have returned negative RAT results and are not symptomatic."

On Friday, there were 20,989 new Covid-19 cases in the community, with seven further deaths.

New Zealand Covid-19

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