New cases of COVID-19 continue to be detected in passengers arriving at New Zealand’s borders, the director-general of health Dr Ashley Bloomfield reported today (Wednesday June 24).

A woman in her sixties who arrived from India on June 18 tested positive for COVID-19 and was transferred from managed isolation to a quarantine facility in Auckland yesterday.

She was tested during the routine testing of all arrivals within their first few days after arrival, Ashley said.

This means New Zealand’s current number of active cases is 11; and New Zealand's total number of confirmed COVID-19 cases stands at 1,166.

Ashley reiterated that New Zealand’s stringent isolation measures for people returning to New Zealand was working. “The 14 day isolation is the mainstay of our border measures and has been in place since April 9,” he said

“We’ve had more than 20,000 people through managed isolation facilities with no evidence of any spread from there into our communities,” he said.

The two UK-based women, who were granted compassionate grounds to leave isolation without having undergone testing but who later tested positive, occurred on June 16 and their case “drew attention to a gap in the system,” he said. 

Since then, however, New Zealand has conducted more than 45,000 tests for COVID-19 and the only cases detected have been the current active 11 cases of people who were in managed isolation facilities at the border.

“In addition, people departing managed isolation must now return a negative test prior to being released from managed isolation,” Ashley said.

Yesterday, New Zealand’s laboratories set a new record processing 9,174 tests. This included tests conducted of people in managed isolation and quarantine as well as thousands of tests conducted in communities throughout the country.  

The total number of tests completed to date is now 357,996.

PHOTO: Supplied