'Questions around the Pullman' being investigated after positive Covid cases linked to Auckland quarantine hotel - Hipkins

January 28, 2021

The Covid-19 Response Minister said guests at the Pullman are now essentially in lockdown while processes are investigated.

Covid-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins says questions around the processes in place at the Pullman Hotel managed isolation facility are being investigated after a series of community Covid-19 cases were confirmed among former guests.

Two more people - an adult and a child - returned weak positive results yesterday after leaving the Pullman on January 15 - they had stayed there at the same time as a community case who tested positive in Northland.

Current guests at the Pullman are being held there while urgent testing is carried out, and Hipkins this morning told Breakfast that processes there are also being examined.

"There do seem to be some questions around the Pullman at the moment," Hipkins told Breakfast today, adding "It would appear something happened in the Pullman".

Hipkins went on to say: "We've got no one leaving the Pullman and we're not going to be putting anybody extra in there, just until we've understood exactly what's been happening here and whether there's more risk around this facility than is acceptable.

"Now, whether there's been some interaction in a lift, or in an exercise area, we have been testing everybody who has left the Pullman during the time period in question, so during January, effectively.

"About 350 people have been tested we've had just under 300 of those results back."

Hipkins said it was important to understand where the weak point was in the hotel's systems and rectify it, but also said by and large the managed isolation hotels were doing well.

With more than 100,000 people going through isolation so far, only a handful of community cases have gotten through, he said.

"It's a virus - there is absolutely no such thing as a zero risk environment when it comes to Covid-19."

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