Today we are reporting 5,656 community cases, 466 hospitalisations and six deaths. Today’s seven-day rolling average of case numbers is 7,414 – last Sunday it was 8,435.
Border case with Omicron BA.4 variant A person who has travelled from overseas to New Zealand has been confirmed as having the BA.4 variant of Omicron.
This is the first known detection of the variant in New Zealand. The person arrived in New Zealand from South Africa on 22 April, returned a positive RAT the following day and a positive PCR test on 24 April.
Whole genome sequencing was undertaken as part of ongoing border surveillance for emerging variants and subsequently confirmed the BA.4 variant.