There were 12,129 new cases of Covid-19 reported in New Zealand in the week to midnight Sunday, and the disease has claimed eight more lives.
The eight deaths bring the country's total Covid tally to 2695.
The Ministry of Health reported 30 deaths with Covid in the past seven days, but said only eight could be attributed to the disease. Seven were determined not to be attributable to Covid, and the cause of death was not yet available in 15 cases.
The ministry said it had recently switched its definition of 'deceased' from deaths within 28 days of testing positive for Covid, to deaths attributed to Covid.
Of the 30 people who died, two were in their 40s, one was in their 50s, five were in their 60s, nine were in their 70s, seven were in their 80s and six were aged over 90. Seventeen were women and 13 were men.
Two of these deaths were in the Southern area, where there were 1332 new cases over the past week.
Of the new cases last week - nearly half were reinfections - 4973, according to the figures from the ministry today.
There were also 219 people with Covid-19 in hospital as of midnight Sunday, with seven cases in ICU.
The seven-day rolling average of cases is just down at 1729.
Last week 2202 new cases were reported and 25 further deaths attributed to the coronavirus.
Cabinet ministers were today due to consider whether to relax the few remaining Covid-19 restrictions. Most pandemic rules were scrapped in September last year, but a mandatory seven-day isolation period remains for those who test positive for the virus.
Prime Minister Chris Hipkins told Morning Report it would be a "carefully balanced decision" whether to drop mandatory isolation."We have to consider all of the ins and outs of removing restrictions, and the risk associated with that. And we've also then got to look at… the benefits of keeping restrictions in place as," Hipkins said.
University of Otago epidemiologist Michael Baker has urged Cabinet to keep the isolation requirements in place. He said vigilance towards Covid-19 was still required as it was the infectious disease killing and hospitalising the most people in Aotearoa.
- RNZ/ODT Online
