There are 4818 new Covid-19 community cases in New Zealand, the Ministry of Health has announced on Thursday.
The cases were reported over the last 24 hours.
There are 571 people in hospital with the virus, 28 fewer than Wednesday.
Thirteen people are in an intensive care or high dependency unit, two more than 24 hours ago.
The average age of those in hospital with Covid-19 is 62.
The seven-day rolling average of Covid hospitalisations is 617, down on 748 a week ago, and down on 630 24 hours ago.
Twenty-four more people with the virus have died.
Of the 24 people who have died, one was in their 60s, one was in their 70s, 13 were in their 80s and nine were aged over 90.
Sixteen were women and eight were men.
Five were from the Auckland region, four each were from Mid Central and Canterbury, three were from Nelson Marlborough, two each were from the Wellington region and Northland, and one each were from Waikato, the Bay of Plenty, Lakes, and Southern.
There are now a total of 1726 deaths confirmed as attributable to Covid-19, either as the underlying cause of death or as a contributing factor.
The seven-day rolling average increase in total deaths attributable to Covid-19 is now 12.
The seven-day rolling average of cases is 4750, down from 6142 a week ago, and down on 4938 24 hours ago.
Thursday's positive cases, detected through rapid antigen tests (RATs) and PCR tests, are located in Northland (193), Auckland (1847), Waikato (424), Bay of Plenty (231), Lakes (77), Hawke's Bay (141), Mid Central (184), Whanganui (55), Taranaki (97), Tairāwhiti (27), Wairarapa (49), Capital and Coast (237), Hutt Valley (163), Nelson Marlborough (116), Canterbury (524), West Coast (61), South Canterbury (64) and Southern (325).
The location of three cases is unknown.
A total of 3733 PCR tests were carried out in the last 24 hours, while 10,977 RAT results were reported.
The number of active community cases is 33,230. They were identified in the past seven days but have not yet been classified as recovered.
An additional 204 people with Covid-19 had recently travelled overseas and arrived back in New Zealand, the ministry said.
On Wednesday, 5169 community cases were announced.
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