21,616 new Covid community cases on Tuesday, 2 deaths

There are 21,616 new Covid-19 cases in the community in New Zealand on Tuesday, the Ministry of Health has announced.

There are 960 people in hospital with the virus, including 22 in an intensive care or high dependency unit.

Tuesday's figure is an increase on Monday's 952 hospitalisations. It is also a slight increase on Monday's ICU numbers of 19.

There have also been two Covid-19 related deaths, the ministry announced.

One of the deaths occurred in the Southern DHB area and one in the Capital and Coast DHB area.

The man and the woman were both over 70.

"Our thoughts and condolences are with the patients' family and friends," the ministry said.

Tuesday's 21,616 positive cases, detected through rapid antigen tests (RATs) and PCR tests, are located in Northland (708), Auckland (6085), Waikato (2062), Bay of Plenty (1424), Lakes (633), Hawke’s Bay (1111), MidCentral (888), Whanganui (276), Taranaki (510), Tairāwhiti (446), Wairarapa (229), Capital and Coast (1584), Hutt Valley (987), Nelson Marlborough (524), Canterbury (2642), South Canterbury (217), Southern (1238) and West Coast (43).

The location of nine cases is unknown.

The ministry said 21,316 of Tuesday's figures were detected through RATs and 317 through PCR tests. A total of 2529 PCR tests were carried out in the last 24 hours, while 51,110 RATs were taken.

The number of active community cases is 193,108. They were identified in the past 10 days but have not yet been classified as recovered.

Director-General of Health Dr Ashley Bloomfield said looking at 559 people in hospital in the Northern Region - Northland, Auckland, Waitematā and Counties Manukau DHBs - with the virus, 40% (233) are aged 70 and over. The average age is 58.

"We have seen a shift towards older people being in hospital," he remarked.

Bloomfield explained the number of people in hospital because of Covid-19 is not able to finalised until they are discharged.

He said there are three groups of people in hospital with the virus - those there due to Covid-related symptoms, those with pre-existing conditions such as diabetes and heart disease which has been exacerbated by the virus, and those in hospital due to other reasons such as an injury or maternity care.

Bloomfield said data from Waikato Hospital from March 2 to 11 gives an insight into how many are in each category.

He said 19% had been admitted and were being looked after in respiratory service due to their Covid-19 related symptoms. Thirty-six per cent had been admitted for other medical care - the virus was not the main reason for their admission. Twenty-three per cent were on surgical wards, 7% were in obstetrics or gynaecology and 15% were children.

Bloomfield said it shows people are largely in hospital with the virus, but not because of it.

Bloomfield presented three slides around Auckland's outbreak during the 1pm update. The first was based around modelling from Te Pūnaha Matatini on three transmission scenarios.

He said the high scenario peak was about 11,000 cases in the Northern Region during the second week of March. The scenario was 50 times more than Delta's peak.

Bloomfield explained case numbers in the region were obviously higher than this and reflected it was perhaps due to the introduction of RATs and their reporting and also high proportion of BA.2 sub-variant cases.

The second slide showed new hospital admissions in the Northern Region had followed the pattern modelled, but the peak would be higher.

The final slide showed how quickly during February Omicron had taken over. He said the BA.2 sub-variant made up 75 to 80% of cases.

The director-general of health also said a report from the Northern Region on March 8 showed just 16% of the people admitted to hospital for the virus in the preceding two weeks had received their booster more than two weeks beforehand.

Only one person admitted to ICU during this time had had their booster at least two weeks prior to admission.

It meant 84% of those in hospital during that time were not fully boosted.

Bloomfield said this clearly emphasises the booster protects from hospitalisations and dying from Omicron, stating three doses of the Covid-19 vaccine was life-saving.

Seventeen new cases at the border were also announced on Tuesday.

On Monday, 15,540 community cases were recorded in New Zealand.