There is one new case of coronavirus at New Zealand's border, the Director-General of Health has revealed in a press conference from Parliament on Tuesday.
The case is a woman in her 30s who arrived in Auckland on July 16. She had flown in from London via Doha and Sydney, Dr Ashley Bloomfield explained.
The woman was staying at the Novotel Ellerslie, and tested positive for COVID-19 on day three of her stay. She has now been transferred to Auckland quarantine facility the Jet Park Hotel.
There remains no evidence of community transmission, and it has now been 81 days since a case of COVID-19 was acquired locally from an unknown source.
The new positive test sees the number of active cases in New Zealand rise one to 27, taking the total number of confirmed cases to 1205.
No one requires hospital-level care, Dr Bloomfield said.
On Monday, New Zealand laboratories processed 1007 tests. This takes the seven-day rolling average to 1984, with the total tests undertaken to date 444,176.
The low testing rates are down to low rates of influenza-like illness in the community - they're around 10-20 percent of what they usually are at this time of the year, Dr Bloomfield says - and a drop-off in testing over school holidays and weekends.
This low testing rate prompted Dr Bloomfield to host a roundtable discussion on Tuesday with clinical leaders around the country about increasing the amount of community-based testing for people with respiratory symptoms.
"We were all extremely conscious of and motivated by the situation Melbourne and Victoria both find themselves in," he said.
"Small breaches there have led to extremely serious consequences, and the health system in Victoria, healthcare workers and the wider public are now at renewed risk.
"We obviously want to avoid that situation here and testing remains a fundamental part of our overall response. We need to make sure we detect any possible cases of COVID-19 in the community as quickly as possible."
Following that discussion, there are now three main action areas for the Ministry of Health.
- A message will be sent out by the College of GPs will send a message to their members with a survey on issues that may be presenting barriers to testing. The message will confirm that swabs should be offered to all people who present to a doctor with respiratory symptoms.
- Working with DHBs to ensure testing remains widely available, including at general practices and community-based assessment centres, and that it's accessible to the population including on the weekends.
- All New Zealanders offered a swab test should take it, as it's a fundamental part of the strategy to get ahead of the disease.
