This brought the total number of active cases in the community outbreak to 562.
There are 522 cases that have been clearly epidemiologically-linked to another case or sub-cluster, and a further 42 for which links are yet to be fully established.
Yesterday 47,897 vaccines were administered, which is a record for a Sunday. Of these 36,476 were first doses and 11,421 were second doses. More than 50% of the eligible population has received at least one vaccine dose
The drop in cases from the weekend – when more than 80 new cases were recorded on both Saturday and Sunday – is a welcome sign as Cabinet prepares to meet to confirm the extension of level 4 for Auckland and Northland from 11.59pm tomorrow.
Most of the new cases will be from tests on Saturday, when 23,000 people were swabbed for Covid-19. That was lower than the 36,000 tests on Thursday and 37,000 on Friday.
Yesterday 16,370 tests were processed across New Zealand.
The Ministry of Health released the case numbers ahead of Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern holding a press conference at 4pm to confirm New Zealand's alert levels.
Of the current community cases, 37 cases are in hospital – 32 are in a stable condition on a ward and five cases are in a stable condition in ICU. Two cases are in North Shore Hospital, 20 are in Middlemore Hospital, 14 are in Auckland City Hospital, and one is in Wellington Regional Hospital.
There are now 79 confirmed cases in the Birkdale Social Network cluster and 280 in the Māngere church cluster.
Expert on NZ's dip in cases
"I think everyone is going to be very cautious about saying anything much about a drop on a single day. All the epidemiologists, you could probably line them all up and they're going to say you need several days of clear decline before we'd say we're getting on top of it."
Baker said while there had been a big bulge of cases exposed to the virus prior to lockdown and subsequent infections of household contacts, alert level effects required at least a couple of generations of cases before they kicked in.
"We'd be hoping to see a decline but the worry is transmission in essential workplace and by large numbers of people - particularly young people - flaunting the lockdown rules."
He said determining where the infection was coming from was going to be vital to stamp out the virus.
Of particular concern was the spread among essential workers and a number of mystery cases that would require a vigorous health response.
Covid in wastewater at North Shore naval base
Twelve wastewater samples were submitted by the Defence Force to ESR. Covid-19 was detected in one sample from Fort Takapuna on Auckland's North Shore from August 23.
The naval base at Devonport and associated accommodation has been at lockdown since that positive test result.
All six people in the Crowne Plaza lobby at the same time as the earliest identified case have tested negative on their day 12 tests.
Cabinet is just hours away from announcing how long the top of the country will remain in lockdown as the virus continues to infect more people every day. It's expected Auckland will stay in Alert Level 4 lockdown for a further fortnight, while Northland remains at the heightened level for one more week. The decision will be announced at 4pm.
Associate Minister of Health Dr Ayesha Verrall today said there were "positive signs" in the Covid response but "mystery cases" still posed a challenge.
She said the levelling out of new cases, along with half being household contacts, was a sign of optimism.
All of those are positive signs that level four is working," Verrall told TVNZ's Breakfast.
However she remained concerned about a group of 53 mystery cases that appeared unlinked.
Health authorities were working to understand the chains of infection.
Covid modeller Professor Shaun Hendy said if the mystery cases couldn't be connected to any known cluster then it would be a concern.
However, at this stage it appeared to be a lag in getting information to Wellington rather than an unsettling development in the outbreak.
On the eve of much of New Zealand heading down to Alert Level 3 Hendy called for a rethink on the way we deal with the Delta variant.
"Looking at Delta it is more transmissable and looking at rules we've had in place of how to operate essential services, businesses, organisations that are open during level four maybe need to be tightened," said Hendy.
"The two metre rule looks to be obsolete with Delta - it's much more about ventilation and mask use - so we may see further tightening of those rules just with that.
