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For third day in a row, Dr Ashley Bloomfield reports no new cases of Covid-19

May 20, 2020

The Director-General of Health Ashley Bloomfield provided the update from Wellington today.

There have been no new cases of Covid-19 in New Zealand reported over the past 24 hours, Director-General of Health Ashley Bloomfield said today.

Dr Bloomfield provided the update at his daily news conference in Wellington.

There were no new cases on Monday or Tuesday, although four people who earlier returned to the country after contracting the virus on a cruise ship off South America had their infections added to NZ's overall total.

Dr Bloomfield also highlighted the results of this morning's World Health Assembly and the agreed upon independent review into how the WHO and individual countries responded to the pandemic.

"For our part, we will be willing participants in any review," Dr Bloomfield said.

"But we're also interested in the many other aspects - for example around vaccines and supply chains."

Dr Bloomfield said that interest isn't just for New Zealand's sake, though.

"An important role for us is to not only support international efforts but to, particularly, work with Pacific Island countries and territories to ensure that they have ready access to a vaccine should one be developed and, of course, their supply chains for medicine and other essential equipment are strong throughout the response."

Today's announcement means New Zealand's total number of people who have or have had Covid-19, including probable cases, remains at 1503. The number of confirmed cases - the number New Zealand gives to the World Health Organisation and compares with other nations - is still 1153.

Of those cases, Dr Bloomfield confirmed 1447 people have recovered, up five on yesterday for 96 per cent of all cases. A recovered case means the person is symptom free for at least 48 hours and it has been at least 10 days since they first became ill.

Dr Bloomfield added there is one person in hospital throughout the country with the virus. The person is not in intensive care.

There are still 16 significant Covid-19 clusters around the country. A significant cluster is a group of 10 or more people who have or have had the coronavirus.

Yesterday, 4882 Covid-19 tests were carried out in New Zealand, bringing the total to 238,725 so far.

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