COVID-19 Update: 23 April 2020

We are at

of New Zealand’s four-level COVID-19 alert system. It is likely Level 4 measures will stay in place for a number of weeks. More information on alert levels.

• Everyone must now stay home, except those providing essential services.
• Only make physical contact with those that you live with.

Government COVID-19 Response Briefing

The All of Government COVID-19 National Response will provide two updates today: one at 1.00 pm, and a second update at 3.00 pm.

1 pm update

Speakers:

• Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern
• Dr Ashley Bloomfield, Director-General of Health.

3 pm update

Speakers:

• Director of Civil Defence Emergency Management, Sarah Stuart-Black
• Police Commissioner, Andrew Coster

Police and Civil Defence Update:

• 4052 breaches of health act
• 377 prosecutions
• 3144 patrols completed 55,000 reports from the public about breaches
• Any travel over ANZAC weekend should be for essential purposes only
• Police will be at holiday spots and on arterial routes to those spots.
• They’ll be stopping people from going to holiday homes
• The police have issued an update on checkpoints put up by certain communities that have felt threatened
• Police are working with those checkpoints to make sure they’re safe and not interfering with lawful use of the road.
• There’s been a 57 per cent fall in road policing issues 43 per cent fall in thefts and burglaries.
• There was an increase in family violence.
• Just under half a million applications for wage and leave subsidies were made in the last month.
• CD has made more than 18k outreach calls to vulnerable groups.
• More than 40k NZers over the age of 70 have been contacted by MSD outreach.
• As of 19 April there have been 2000 travel applications approved
• These are usually for people who have been quarantined in Auckland and then need to travel home.
• Roughly 2000 people in mandatory isolation.
• 15,474 people have left on chartered repatriation flights
• 2000 people will leave on chartered flights to the UK and Thailand.
• The first flight from India is expected to leave on 24 April
• The majority of repatriation flights are coming in to Auckland

Ministry of Health Update:

• 2 new deaths to report, They were based in Dunedin and Christchurch.
• 3 new cases
• 1451 cases, same as yesterday, remains same level because the positive cases may have already been recorded in Uruguay.
• 101,277 tests processed so far
• 6480 tests yesterday
• 8 people in hospital, 1 in ICU
• 16 significant clusters
• Health services under level 3: hospitals remain open for acute care

Prime Minister Update:

• Hunting can go ahead under alert level 3 but People need to stay in their region and bubble to do so. Greens wanted all hunting to remain bannned, NZ First stamped their foot.
• Duck hunting season was due to begin in May.
• Cabinet concerned some people would be excluded
• But it will go ahead in the 2nd weekend after NZ goes into alert level 2. The season will also be extended.
• On ANZAC day Ardern will be taking part in “stand at dawn”
• People will go to their letterboxes and stand in silence at dawn.
• Everyone can do this at 6am April 25.
• RNZ national will broadcast an official address from Defence Minister Ron Mark.

Broadcasting Package Details:

Here is the detail from the press release:

• $20.5 million to cut 100% of Kordia TV/FM transmission fees for 6 months
• $600,000 to cut 100% of RNZ AM transmission fees for 6 months
• $16.5 million to reduce, by 80%, media organisations’ NZ On Air content contribution fees for the 2020/21 financial year.
• $1.3 million to purchase central government news media subscriptions in advance for the 2020/21 financial year and encouraging Crown entities to increase their uptake of news media subscriptions.
• $11.1 million for specific targeted assistance to companies as and when needed.
• Commitment to build on the Local Democracy Reporting pilot as part of longer term support
• The direct cost of the package is $50 m
• State broadcasters will be able to access the $11m fund.
• This is the first package, it won’t be able to cure all media problem
• Faafoi won’t rule out letting media companies fail.
• The $1.3 million will be for subscriptions to smaller media mainly
• The RNZ/TVNZ merger is “on ice”.
• The Government as spend, Faafoi said, is $110 million 18/19 and 30 per cent to online platforms. Rest was TV, radio print etc.
• So roughly $33m on Facebook, Google etc.

Yesterday’s details:

• 6 new cases
• One more death, a woman in her 80s associated with the Rosewood cluster. Associated with the Burwood cluster.
• 1451 total number
• Labs processed a record number of tests: 5289
• We have stock for another 87,000 tests
• DHBs making efforts to reach Maori, using Maori health providers and mobile testing.
• There’s a new s70 notice under the health act. These are the notices that trigger the special powers currently being used.

Notes:

1. Note: Three confirmed cases reported yesterday have been reclassified as under investigation to allow checks on whether they were counted in Uruguay’s case total before arrival in New Zealand. This is to prevent double counting by the World Health Organization. We had two new confirmed cases in the past 24 hours, making a total decrease of 1 case today.

View details of confirmed and probable cases.

View details of significant COVID-19 clusters.

View testing data by region.

View interactive map and dashboard.

Confirmed and probable cases by DHB

Total cases by DHB in hospital

Note: One of the 8 in hospital is in ICU as at 9:00am 23 April 2020

The above count excludes the five patients in Waitakere Hospital who have been moved from their aged residential care facility due to staffing issues.

Download the Map of confirmed and probable cases by DHB (PDF, 282 KB).

Total cases in hospital by DHB

Epidemic Curve

Total Cases by Age and Gender

Ethnicity percentages of all cases

Note: A person who identifies with more than one ethnic group is allocated to a single ethnic group in the following order of priority: Maori, Pacific, Asian and European/Other.

For a detailed break down of ethnicity and DHB region testing see Testing by region.

Transmission

This information refers to the 1,451 confirmed and probable cases as at 9.00 am 23 April 2020.

Lab testing and capacity

Source: ESR EpiSurv extract as at 09:00 23 April 2020

For a detailed break down of ethnicity and DHB region testing see Testing by region.

COVID-19 – tests by day and cumulative

Note: Two sets of cumulative test data have been reconciled to give cumulative total from 22 January 2020 when testing began.