Omicron outbreak: 7605 Covid cases, 41 deaths

Ashley Bloomfield’s final message to New Zealand as director general of health. Video / Ministry of Health

Deaths linked to Covid have hit 41 in today’s update, with 7605 new community cases of the virus reported.

A total of 799 people are in hospital with the virus, including 25 patients in ICU.

Of today’s 41 deaths, one was aged in their 50s, one was in their 60s, eight were in their 70s, 12 were in their 80s and 19 were aged over 90. Of these people, 22 were women and 19 were men.

Fourteen of these people were from Auckland region, three were from Waikato, two were from Bay of Plenty, three were from Lakes, two were from Hawke’s Bay, one was from Taranaki, two were from MidCentral, two were from Whanganui, two were from Wellington region, seven were from Canterbury, three were from Southern.

There is now a total of 1479 deaths confirmed as attributable to Covid, either as the underlying cause of death or as a contributing factor, the Ministry of Health said in today’s update.

The average increase in deaths each day attributable to Covid, over the past seven days, is now 18.

There are currently 53,301 active Covid cases in this country.

The seven-day rolling average of community case numbers today is 7618 – this time last week it was 8915.

The location of the 799 cases in hospital are: Northland (21), Waitematā (100), Counties Manukau (51), Auckland (93), Waikato (97), Bay of Plenty (35), Lakes (16), Hawke’s Bay (44), MidCentral (48), Whanganui (13), Taranaki (21), Tairāwhiti (five), Wairarapa (seven), Capital & Coast/Hutt (45), Nelson Marlborough (17), Canterbury/West Coast (129), South Canterbury (13) and Southern (44).

The average age of current Covid hospitalisations is 64.

Of the 7605 new cases reported today, 313 had recently travelled overseas.

Today’s update comes as departing pandemic health boss Ashley Bloomfield issued one last warning to “not let up now” as he thanked Kiwis for their efforts against Covid-19.

Today marks the final day in the office for the outgoing director general of health, who is stepping away from his top public servant job.

This week, the country’s top doctor gave his 307th Covid update since the start of the pandemic in March 2020, sharing heartening news that case rates in the second Omicron wave were trending down and the worst fears of earlier modelling would not likely eventuate.

And this morning he made one final appearance on social media to thank everyone and urge people to keep up the great work against the virus.

“Kia ora New Zealand. As I finish up in the role of director general I wanted to take a moment to thank you so much for all the hard work you’ve put in over the past two-and-a-half years as part of New Zealand’s response to the pandemic.

“We’ve been successful because we did it as a team.

“But don’t let up now. Keep up the great work. We’re not, as I say, out of the woods yet but we can always see a path through the woods.

“We’ve forged our own path – let’s keep doing it.”

Yesterday there were 7627 new community cases and 827 people in hospital with the virus, including 24 in intensive care.

There were a further 38 deaths, bringing the tally of people who had died with Covid to 138 since Monday.

The seven-day rolling average of deaths is now 18.

Meanwhile, the seven-day rolling average of community cases was now sitting at 7776, down from 9161 at the same time last week.

In his update earlier this week, Bloomfield said Covid hospitalisation rates continued to stay steady or increase. While there was a chance they could still rise to over 1000, the revised peak was 850, which we came close to last weekend.

After 25 years in the health service, Bloomfield has called time on his job, leading a health response to a potentially deadly virus that he maintains saved tens of thousands of lives.

Staff form a guard of honour for Dr Ashley Bloomfield as he leaves his last Covid-19 response update press conference. Photo / Mark MitchellWhile his term was due to end in June 2023, the health boss is now looking forward to taking a break from a “relentless” work life.

“Those first two or three months were really probably the most stressful time because things were evolving so quickly, and we just didn’t know where it was going to go,” Bloomfield told the Herald.

Director-General of Health Dr Ashley Bloomfield during his final Covid-19 response update at the Ministry of Health in Wellington. Photo / Mark Mitchell”The moments of waking up at three in the morning in a cold sweat, night after night, dreaming about Covid, and just really wondering where this was going.”

Bloomfield remains quiet on his next steps, revealing only he is looking forward to a “good break planned on the home front”.

As with many after a “tough” few years, he said it was important to “decompress, get my cortisol levels down again”.