‘Extensive testing’ in New Zealand has not uncovered new cases
4861 Min Read
“Extensive” Covid-19 testing of thousands of people in New Zealand has not uncovered any new cases, health officials say. The testing was undertaken after a quarantine bungle when two women were allowed out of managed isolation without being tested – and later turned out to have the coronavirus.
Dr Ashley Bloomfield, the director-general of health, is giving a news conference in the capital, Wellington, during which he said the day of zero new cases of Covid-19 to report was “very reassuring.”
He said 6,273 tests for the virus were completed by laboratories yesterday as officials tried to track down any possible contacts of the two travelers returning from Britain who were mistakenly allowed out of quarantine without being tested.
The number of tests carried out on Thursday was “much higher than we have been doing in recent weeks,” Bloomfield said.
New Zealand had reported 24 days of no new cases of Covid-19, and had no active cases remaining in the country, when the two women who had arrived from Britain were permitted to leave quarantine on compassionate grounds to visit a dying parent. One later developed symptoms, and both were diagnosed with the virus.
