A person connected to the Papatoetoe cluster has tested positive for Covid-19 after earlier testing negative.
That person has been in quarantine from Tuesday this week and is a household contact of the last three cases.
After the first negative test, the individual developed symptoms and returned the positive test.
Because that may mean the person was possibly infectious for up to 48 hours prior to developing symptoms, the individual’s workplace is being treated as a location of interest by the Ministry of Health.
The person worked at KFC Botany Downs between Monday, February 22 at 3.30pm until 12.30am on Tuesday, February 23.
A total of 11 people worked at KFC at the same time as the case. These people will be tested and required to isolate for 14 days along with their household contacts.
Other contacts
Members of the public who entered the store during that time are considered close contacts and should isolate at home for the remainder of the 14 day period (until March 8), and be tested on day 5 (tomorrow) and day 12.
Members of the public who went through the KFC drive-through between 3.30pm Monday 22 February and 12.30am on Tuesday 23 February are casual plus contacts and should isolate at home until a negative day 5 test result is returned. Day 5 is tomorrow so they should get tested tomorrow and remain isolated until they get their test result.
The ministry is asking anyone affected by this latest KFC exposure event to get tested tomorrow, not today, to limit waiting times at testing centres. All contacts should call Healthline.
Progress at high school
The first cluster case had 31 close contacts at the school and one of these tested positive. All others have tested negative for Covid-19.
All the remaining students and staff at the school have been designated as Casual Plus contacts of Case A.
There have been 1,537 casual plus contacts.
Other than the three positive cases found two days ago 1,520 have returned at least one negative test result since February 15.
All casual plus contacts have been undergoing a follow-up test on or after February 22. So far, all results from the additional testing have been negative.
The Ministry of Health says it continues to work closely with the school to ensure all staff and students are tested. Where necessary, this includes visits to students' homes to make sure people are getting the support they need to access testing and remain isolated.
Kmart Botany contacts
A total 32 staff members have been identified as close plus contacts. This number has increased from that previously reported after further. All these people have been contacted and are self-isolating.
So far there are 24 negative test results from this group; testing of others is being done "at the appropriate time", the ministry says.
The ministry has been contacted by 1,742 people who reported being at the store at the times of interest. They have been asked to isolate for 14 days and be tested at day 5 and day 12 after their exposure to the case. So far there are 1,073 negative test results for this group.
New testing station
An additional testing centre is being set up in East Auckland tomorrow. For up-to-date information on testing locations in Auckland, visit https://www.arphs.health.nz/ and all testing locations nationwide, visit the Healthpoint website. One previously reported case has now recovered. The total number of active cases in New Zealand is 67. The total number of confirmed cases is 2,015.
The total number of tests processed by laboratories to date is 1,693,679.
On Thursday, 10,123 tests were processed. The seven-day rolling average up to yesterday is 7,570 tests processed.
NZ COVID Tracer now has 2,683,760 registered users. This is an increase of more than 118,000 users in the last fortnight. Poster scans have reached 196,532,281 and users have created 7,866,685 manual diary entries. Scans in the last 24 hours 1,390,849.
In addition to the community test, two cases were found in managed isolation hotels. The first from the UK tested positive on day 1 while the second person from the Philippines tested positive on day 12.
