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The Health Ministry is reducing the frequency of its regular Covid-19 updates to four times a week.
The news comes as the ministry announced a new Covid-19 case in New Zealand on Monday, in isolation.
The Covid-19 updates, which had been released every day at 1 pm, will now be scheduled for Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Sunday.
LAWRENCE SMITH
Travelers in Auckland are required to wear masks while traveling on public transport. (File photo)
On those days, the Ministry will report the cases that have tested positive in isolation administered in the days prior to the last update.
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Any “significant development”, such as a case arising in the community, will be reported earlier if necessary, the ministry said.
The new arrangement will begin on Wednesday, December 16.
“At this stage in New Zealand’s response to Covid-19, we are seeing cases routinely appearing at the border in recent returnees in managed isolation facilities,” the ministry said.
“We hope this will continue to be the case as long as we remain at alert level 1 with the isolation requirements managed.”
ROBERT KITCHEN / Things
During the Covid-19 shutdown, CEO of Health Ashley Bloomfield became a familiar face to Kiwis.
The new Covid-19 case arrived on December 4 from the United Kingdom via Hong Kong. They tested positive upon arrival and were transferred to the Auckland quarantine facility, the Health Ministry said.
There were no new cases of the virus on Sunday.
Meanwhile, New Zealand has reserved 1.5 million doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, which will protect 750,000 people as a double dose is needed.
The first vaccines, which must be kept at -70 degrees Celsius, could be implemented in early 2021.
The ministry said it had purchased nine large -80 ° C freezers that can store more than 1.5 million doses of vaccine.
The freezers are due to arrive in New Zealand by the end of the year and will become the central storage facility for vaccines requiring ultra-cold temperatures.
On December 2, the UK became the first place in the world to approve the Pfizer / BioNTech vaccine, less than a month after the preliminary findings were published.
On Saturday, a team of firefighters were unable to board a container ship at PrimePort Timaru due to a suspected case of Covid-19 on the ship.
JOHN BISSET / Stuff
PrimePort Timaru was evacuated over the weekend.
The port was evacuated shortly after 1.30 pm when emergency services initially investigated a 30-ton container aboard the Rio Blanco container ship that was reported to have a possible carbon monoxide leak.
Crews knew there was a possible case of Covid-19 aboard the ship after communications with New Zealand Customs and Port personnel, a Fire & Emergency spokesperson said.
A previously reported case in New Zealand has now recovered, bringing the total number of active cases to 56.
The total number of confirmed cases is 1,723.
On Sunday, laboratories processed 2,315 tests for the virus, bringing the total number of tests completed to date to 1,312,307.
