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No new cases in NZ, 16 people linked to NSW locations of interest found

Author
NZ Herald ,
Publish Date
Tue, 22 Jun 2021, 1:04PM
After almost a month of restrictions, quarantine-free travel between Melbourne and New Zealand is set to be restored. (Photo / Getty)
After almost a month of restrictions, quarantine-free travel between Melbourne and New Zealand is set to be restored. (Photo / Getty)

No new cases in NZ, 16 people linked to NSW locations of interest found

Author
NZ Herald ,
Publish Date
Tue, 22 Jun 2021, 1:04PM

The travelling public is set to enjoy quarantine-free flights with Victoria in a little over 12 hours, nearly a month after a Covid outbreak hit the state.

There are no new Covid community cases today.

There are also no cases to report among recent returnees in managed isolation facilities since the Ministry's last update yesterday.

There were 16 contacts who had been identified in New Zealand as being at locations of interest in Sydney, however.

The majority of these contacts self-identified through Healthline and have been provided appropriate health advice to stay at home and be tested, the Ministry said.

Five of them are required to isolate for 14 days and be tested twice in that time, and all have returned a negative first test.

A further 11 are required to self-isolate until they return a negative day-five test. Of those, eight have returned a negative test and three are outstanding.

Quarantine-free travel with New South Wales remains in place, meanwhile, but health officials were keeping an eye on developments in the Australian State, the Ministry of Health said.

Contact tracing teams last week got in touch with 6824 passengers from New South Wales, who arrived in New Zealand before last Wednesday, when the first recent community case in Sydney was announced.

These were travellers who had been in NSW since June 11.

"We also want to remind anyone with symptoms to get tested. This advice applies to everyone, not just recent travellers," the Ministry said.

Quarantine-free travel between New Zealand and Victoria is set to resume at 11.59pm.

There have been no new local cases in the past 24 hours as the Garden State brings its latest outbreak under control.

But at the same time officials are keeping a close watch on New South Wales, where a fresh community outbreak has emerged in the past week.

There are now 21 community cases linked to the highly infectious Delta virus strain with 10 new cases announced today.

At this point the public health risk is deemed low, and while officials are regularly reviewing developments, there was no change in present travel arrangements.

Queensland Health Authorities yesterday confirmed a community case in an aircrew worker.

Anyone who had been in the Brisbane Airport DFO outlet store or the Brisbane Portuguese Family Centre on Saturday was asked to contact Healthline, get tested and stay home until they received a negative result.

Yesterday, the Ministry of Health said there were now 23 cases of Covid in New Zealand.

Three new cases were from recent returnees, with one infection detected during a routine day-12 test.

The infected person had arrived from Germany on June 8. Another person who tested positive on day 10 was a contact of a case. They had arrived from Afghanistan on June 9.

The third person arrived from India on Saturday and tested positive during a day-1 routine test.

The pause came into effect on May 25 when a fast-growing Covid cluster emerged in Melbourne.

An initial 72-hour pause was extended as the state went into a circuit-breaker lockdown.

On June 9 restrictions were relaxed with New Zealand citizens and permanent residents - including Australian citizens normally resident in New Zealand - and those with humanitarian exemptions and critical workers stranded in Victoria were once again able to fly to New Zealand.

But there was a pre-requisite negative pre-departure Covid test.

In the past week there have been no new cases in the garden state, with the Delta variant of concern.

With New Zealand health officials deeming the public health risk to be low, the pause is set to be lifted.

Travellers will no longer be required to have a pre-departure test.

Despite this, officials are urging all travellers to continue monitoring for symptoms and checking the Victorian Health website for any updated locations of interest.

Those in New Zealand who have recently been in Victoria, New South Wales or Queensland are advised to get tested if they developed symptoms.

At the same time, anyone in New Zealand who had been at any of the current locations of interest or newly identified locations of interest in Australia over the past 14 days should continue to self-isolate and contact Healthline for advice on testing.

Victorian health officials have determined there is unlikely to be widespread community transmission. They continue to carry out about 15,000 tests a day and there has been no unexplained Covid-19 detected in wastewater samples.

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