Another 26 people have died with Covid-19 and there are 8728 new cases today, the Ministry of Health says.
Photo: AFP / Science Photo Library
The seven-day rolling average of new community cases is 8913, dropping sharply from 9994 this time last week.
In today's statement, the ministry said there were 759 people in hospital with the coronavirus, including 13 in ICU.
Two of the 26 people with Covid-19 whose deaths were reported today were in their 60s, three were in their 70s, 10 were in their 80s and 11 were aged over 90. Eight were men and 18 were women.
Five were from Auckland region, two were from Waikato, one was from Bay of Plenty, one was from Lakes, one was from Tairāwhiti, one was from Hawke's Bay, two were from MidCentral, two were from Nelson Marlborough, eight were from Canterbury, three were from Southern.
The total number of publicly reported deaths with Covid-19 is now 1954.
The ministry said today the number of new cases that had recently travelled overseas was 359.
Yesterday 9953 new cases of Covid-19 were reported, along with a further 32 deaths.
There has now been a total of 1,538,320 cases of Covid-19 in New Zealand.
Many of the country's aged care homes are battling outbreaks of Omicron. The Aged Care Association says as facilities try to shore up their defences against Covid-19, the sector is also having to deal with chronic staff shortages.
Air New Zealand chief executive Greg Foran today said staff numbers due to winter illness including Covid was one of the challenges it was dealing with in rebooking passengers whose flights were cancelled due to yesterday's storm. Staff absenteeism rates were three times higher than normal, he said.
