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Dunedin and Invercargill hospitals would have been turning patients away from their intensive care units by the end of this month, if the worst case scenario for Covid-19 had played out.
Modeling done around the start of the lockdown for the Southern DHB shows a worst case scenario of 56 intensive care patients.
That's 24 more than its maximum if using every coronavirus emergency measure.
The region had a high rate of the disease early on and was home to two of the first clusters.
Southern DHB chief executive Chris Fleming told health correspondent Rowan Quinn it shows how devastating the virus could have been.