NZ's five new Delta Covid cases all linked

 

What you need to know:

• New Zealand moved to alert level 4 lockdown at 11:59pm on Tuesday
• The lockdown is for seven days in Auckland and three days in the rest of the country
• Four more community cases of Covid-19 were confirmed this morning.
• They are linked to the first case, a 58-year-old man who lives in Devonport. The man and his wife visited Coromandel last week
• Locations of interest in in Auckland and Coromandel are available on the Ministry of Health website
• The vaccination rollout is suspended for 48 hours
• No links between the case and the border or managed isolation have been established
• The New Zealand Nurses Organisation has called off strke action planned for Thursday
• Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and Director General of Health Ashley Bloomfield will provide another update at 1pm today

An unvaccinated Devonport tradesman, an Auckland City Hospital nurse and other household contacts are among five positive cases of the highly infectious Delta variant confirmed in our biggest city.

• What you can and can't do under Level 4
• Five cases: What we know about them
• Southerners warned not to be complacent

Contact tracers and ESR experts are racing to confirm the extent of community transmission after the community cases were identified yesterday, plunging the country into lockdown.

Auckland City Hospital has taken immediate action to shut down any potential spread after a fully vaccinated nurse was infected who had been working on a ward in recent days.

Long queues of cars have inundated Auckland testing stations this morning and supermarkets have reported panic buying as people stock up on essential supplies.

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern confirmed today that five community cases of Covid have now been identified - all the highly infectious Delta strain - with no obvious link to the border or MIQ.

The first, a 58-year-old Devonport man was confirmed yesterday, sending the country into a snap alert level 4 lockdown.

Ardern told The AM Show the latest cases came through very late last night but any new locations of interest would be updated as soon as they became available.

Ardern said the man was a "tradesperson" and, as well as 15 locations of interest already announced, seven other locations he has visited were private homes.

A co-worker of the man has since tested positive along with three close contacts of the co-worker.

One is the Auckland Hospital nurse, which has sparked emergency measures at Auckland District Health Board to contain any potential hospital outbreak to protect staff and patients.

An email sent to staff says the DHB is concerned about a "hospital outbreak" and it is taking "a number of precautions".

Detailed contact tracing was under way and anyone who had been on Ward 65 in the past five days was asked to get a Covid test.

"Auckland City Hospital has taken immediate actions to shut down any potential spread," the Ministry of Health said.

"Those actions include stopping unnecessary movements between wards, testing all staff and patients on the ward the health professional worked on and standing down, testing and isolating staff on the same ward."

Covid-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins said contact tracers were working at speed to identify the chain of transmission, where the virus came from and where it had spread to.

"The faster we do that the faster we get out of it.

"We know it's the Delta variant we're dealing with. We don't yet know where the linkage may be."

Experts were now going through New Zealand and Australian genome sequencing databases in a bid to identify where the infection had originated.

Fifteen separate locations of interest had so far been confirmed after the original case travelled to Coromandel last weekend while infectious.

The locations of interest would be updated throughout the morning, and were expected to grow "quite a bit".

Ardern and director general of health Ashley Bloomfield will provide further information at today's 1pm media conference, including latest testing results and any further cases.

On the prospect of mandatory mask use and scanning, Hipkins said there will be places people have to scan in, "and there will be wider use of masks at alert level 2 and above".

Details would be released later today.

"My guidance to people this morning is if you're leaving home and you're going to be anywhere where there's other people, wear a mask."

"If you're going to the supermarket wear a mask. If you're going to the supermarket to fill up your car, wear a mask."

Auckland and Coromandel are expected to be at alert level 4 for at least seven days, while the rest of the country will be locked down for at least three days.

Hipkins said extra testing facilities would be popping up all over the country. There were also plans for "surge testing".

"The more tests we can do, particularly people who are showing any symptoms at all, the quicker we will be able to get on top of this."

Hipkins said he understood the fully vaccinated Auckland Hospital nurse had not been showing any symptoms.

"It is possible we're going to pick up cases of people who don't show symptoms."

Using the Covid Tracer app and getting a test if you felt unwell would help "run down this virus" and prevent it spreading in the community.

Work was also under way on the vaccine rollout to make it safe under alert level 4.

The Government was looking at drive through vaccination centres "where you can go and park up in a car park, someone will give you your vaccine, you wait for 20 minutes in your own car and then once you've been given the all clear you drive home again."

Hipkins said such clinics could be set up within the next 24-48 hours.

Meanwhile, there have been reports of Aucklanders fleeing the city last night after the lockdown was announced.

Concerned residents blocked State Highway 25 at Manaia, on the Coromandel Peninsula late last night after news that the infected Devonport man and his wife had travelled to Coromandel town on Friday.

Locals were asking anyone using the road for their essential workers certificate or proof of residence to get through, sparking tense scenes.

A resident posted on a Facebook page that traffic flow towards Manaia "has slowed right down".

"Manaia bridge is still closed and will be for as long as it takes to secure our community's health," the resident wrote this morning.

One of the Auckland locations of interest identified by health authorities is opening its doors today.

The Devonport pharmacy is open and staff are serving people. A staff member told the Herald they were too busy to comment.

There was no signs that the pharmacy was a location of interest.

The pharmacy told customers on a Facebook post this morning that it would be opening according to alert level 4 guidelines.

The post said four of the pharmacy's staff members are in isolation for 14 days after the infected Devonport man visited the chemist on Monday afternoon.

"We appreciate your help, patience and understanding during short-staffed two weeks period.

"Please stay home if feeling unwell and call / email us instead."

Deputy Prime Minister Grant Robertson told Newstalk ZB's Mike Hosking there was no known link with the Covid-positive UN worker who was recently flown to New Zealand from Fiji in a medevac transfer.

Robertson said the vaccination programme was on a "brief pause" while the Government handled the immediate impact of the new cases. Arden said vaccine centres should reopen in less than 48 hours.

Robertson said the cost of a week-long lockdown was up to $1.5 billion. "Overall this is still the best economic response."

The Reserve Bank's OCR announcement would still go ahead today.

Ardern told TVNZ all wastewater tests were clear except for the closest one to the Jet Park MIQ facility in Auckland. More wastewater testing would be carried out in the Coromandel.

"My very simple message: please stay at home," the Prime Minister appealed to the nation this morning. "Stick to your bubble, stay home."

Ardern said the Government's hope was a high number of people being vaccinated, along with other public health measures such as contact tracing, would reduce the number of lockdowns going forward.

She was confident New Zealand could beat Covid again by using the same tools it had used before, as long as everyone adhered to the rules. Her final message: "Stay safe everyone."

The lockdown is the first full one in more than a year, and has seen a "return of the bubble", limited travel, a 48-hour amnesty for people to return to their homes, and a 48-hour pause on vaccinations.

The Devonport man returned a positive test on Tuesday, and is believed to have been infectious since August 12. He and his wife travelled to Coromandel township on Friday and stayed for the weekend, before the man developed symptoms and on Monday sought a test.

There are 23 "exposure events" linked to the man -15 have so far been released as locations of interest - meaning they require further contact tracing. These locations include 12 in the Coromandel, 2 in Auckland and 1 in Mangatarata.

His wife had been fully vaccinated and returned a negative test. The man himself was eligible to be vaccinated, but had issues booking an appointment through the online system.

Both had been self-isolating at home but were being transferred to Jet Park quarantine facility.

Ardern said there was no known link to the border or any other cases thus far which, coupled with an assumption he had the highly-infectious Delta variant, was behind the decision to plunge the country back into full lockdown for the first time in more than a year.

Every case of Covid-19 picked up at the border over the past three weeks had been Delta.

New Zealand had seen what had occurred around the world in outbreaks of this new variant, which was twice as infectious and led to higher rates of hospitalisations and deaths, particularly across the Tasman in New South Wales, Ardern said.

Delta was a "game-changer" and there needed to be a rapid response to stop the spread.

"We only get one chance. One of the worst things about Covid-19 is the absolute uncertainty it creates, but we know this strategy works, and we know life will get easier. We just need to keep going."

The three-day nationwide lockdown was to get various test results, identify contacts and the spread, and find any undetected cases. Auckland and Coromandel would most likely be in lockdown for seven days due to the proximity of the case, Ardern said.

Level 4 means schools and all education centres will be closed. Non-essential workers need to stay home, and everybody needs to keep to their "bubbles".

People should only leave their homes to buy essential items, and for exercise in their immediate neighbourhoods.

Masks were not mandatory, but Ardern said people were strongly encouraged to wear them at all times outside their bubbles and maintain at least a two-metre distance with others.

National Party leader Judith Collins said she supported the quick move to lockdown given the transmissibility of the Delta variant.

"It is better to act now to stamp out the spread of Covid-19 than to take half measures which do not work and result in it taking longer to shut down the spread."

Both Collins and Act leader David Seymour said it was crucial vaccinations began again as soon as possible, given the low level of coverage in New Zealand and the harm Delta had done in countries with even fairly high levels of vaccination.

Auckland Mayor Phil Goff said the Government had made the right decision but understood it would be hard on the community and businesses.

"To successfully contain the spread of the virus everyone has to play their part and follow the rules.

"We have a collective responsibility to each other, and it is unacceptable for anyone out of selfish reasons to put themselves, their families and their communities at risk."

Council facilities such as libraries, leisure centres and pools, the museum, zoo, halls, playgrounds and public toilets would be closed.

Auckland Transport would continue its core services for essential workers, but passengers needed to socially distance and wear masks.

Other essential council services would continue.

Robertson said a week-long level 4 lockdown had been estimated to cost the economy $1.4 billion.

The wage subsidy support had been triggered given the lockdown would last seven days. Businesses that met the criteria could apply from Friday.

The resurgence support scheme was also available.

Following news of the lockdown, the New Zealand Nurses Organisation (NZNO) called off a planned strike over pay and conditions for Thursday, saying people's health and wellbeing had to "remain our number one priority".