There are two new COVID-19 cases, the Ministry of Health has revealed - one in a managed isolation and quarantine (MIQ) facility and the other a historical case.
It comes after two cases were detected in the community earlier this week, the latest of which was announced on Tuesday evening. That case - a second managed isolation worker in Christchurch - was formally added to New Zealand's total on Wednesday.
The imported case in MIQ arrived in the country on October 31 from Singapore, testing positive for coronavirus on around day three of their stay. They have now been transferred to the Jet Park Hotel, Auckland's quarantine facility.
The historical case is a person who landed in New Zealand from Japan on October 18. They tested positive on around day 12, but the ministry says "subsequent negative repeat PCR tests, high CT values and positive serology" has given it confidence it's not a recent infection.
Five cases have recovered in the last 24 hours, which sees the total number of active cases fall to 73.
The total number of of confirmed and probable cases in New Zealand now stands at 1968.
Meanwhile laboratories processed another 7171 coronavirus tests on Tuesday, bringing the total number of tests completed to date to 1,113,739.
More details released about second community case
A second worker at the Sudima Christchurch Airport facility - where foreign mariners are isolating - was recorded on Tuesday night.
This person - who remains asymptomatic - had only very recently been tested as part of their routine testing of staff in the facility, returning a negative test.
However as a result of the first community case detected this week, other staff at the facility who worked relevant shifts were contacted and tested as appropriate, the ministry says.
It was during this testing the second case - a close workplace contact - was detected.
The second case visited a Chemist Warehouse at the South City Mall between 3:52pm and 4:03pm on Friday, October 30. All those who logged in using the COVID Tracer app and were in the store at a similar time have been notified.
"The person had checked in using COVID Tracer - an important reminder for us all to keep using the app so the system can work quickly to identify people who may have been exposed," the ministry says.
"In this case, the person was in the store for a very short period of time and didn’t have any close contact with other people during their time there, so the visit is regarded as very low risk and a ‘casual’ exposure event."
Genome sequencing of the first infected staff member indicates a link to five of the international mariners at the facility. The genome has not been seen in New Zealand before, the ministry says.
The results means all the international mariners have had their stays extended until Friday as an additional precautionary measure, a decision that will be reviewed again as case investigations continue.
Genome sequencing of the second staff member is underway.
The ministry says an investigation into how these workers contracted COVID-19 is underway and "will be thorough".
"[It] includes full assessment of the cases' movements in the facilities, intensive review of video footage and further interviews with the two cases to determine any potential sources of infection."
