News
The All of Government COVID-19 National Response will provide an update at 1.00 pm today.
NOTE: Once the Livestream starts we update what the speakers have to say below.
Apr 17, 2020 1:03 PMRNZ Live
- The man in his 90s was connected to the Matamata cluster while the woman was connected to the Rosewood rest home.
- Two further deaths have occurred. One was a man in his 90s at Waikato Hospital, the other was a woman in her 80s at Burwood Hospital in Christchurch.
- New combined total is 1409
- 8 new cases, two confirmed, six probable – Dr Caroline McElnay
- Total tests to date is 74,401.
- 4241 test were processed yesterday.
- The number of clusters remains 16.
- Grant Robertson is reminding New Zealanders that just because they announced the level three lockdown guidelines yesterday doesn’t mean the public can start behaving like the country is in level three.
- Finance Minister Grant Robertson sends his thoughts to the families of the two people who died.
- Total tests to date is 74,401.
- Two of the ICU patients are in a critical condition – that’s unchanged from yesterday.
- Dr Caroline McElnay says the MOH is still considering if they will allow any changes going forward to patients in hospital – specifically around whether family members will be allowed to be there when someone is in hospital/ICU.
- Cabinet has not made its decision yet on what level NZ will be in once the four weeks is up, it is still waiting on more data before making its decision – Grant Robertson
- To date, the Wage Subsidy scheme has paid out $9.9bn since it was set up on 17 March – Grant Robertson.”This is a long game – a marathon – not a short sprint,” Grant Robertson.
- 14 people are in hospital with Covid-19, three are in ICU.
- Random testing for Covid-19 is underway in Christchurch to try and determine the extent of its community spread.
- Pegasus Health has set up a clinic outside the Moorhouse Avenue Pak’n Save, to take swabs from about 250 to 300 volunteers without symptoms of the virus.
- It follows random testing in Queenstown yesterday results are expected within 48 hours.
- Chief executive of Pegasus Health, Vince Barry says the data will be shared with the Ministry of Health to help the government work out when to lift lockdown restrictions.
- He says about 80 tests have been done so far, and it’s a fairly quick process for volunteers who can either drive through or walk up.
- Grant Robertson says the NRL’s plans to restart in late May seems ambitious to him and that there would need to be serious talks between NZ and Aus governments about whether the Warriors would be allowed into Australia and the quarantine conditions they’d need to go through. Says that he hasn’t been in talks with NRL officials but they have been in touch with Sport New Zealand.
- Grant Robertson says the government is still considering what is the best way to undertake contract tracing on the national level -whether than involves using a card that is sent to every person in the country, an app on phones etc.
- When asked about the Invercargill man’s postmortem Dr Caroline McElnay said it was yet to receive the any report.
Providing today’s update are Finance Minister Grant Robertson and Director of Public Health Dr Caroline McElnay.
Speakers:
Hon Grant Robertson, Minister of Finance
Dr Caroline McElnay, Director of Public Health.
A Livestream of the update starts at 1pm, watch below.
https://youtu.be/6shWBewffao