No new community cases of Covid-19 have been reported in New Zealand today with five new cases in managed isolation.
Photo: AFP
In a statement, the Ministry of Health said the number of active cases in New Zealand is now 48 and there have been a total of 2447 cases.
The five new cases came from Indonesia, Fiji, the UAE and the UK.
One of the new cases is a mariner, unrelated to the Viking Bay or Playa Zahara. The ministry is still trying to determine their travel history.
Four crew members are still in quarantine onboard the Viking Bay fishing vessel at Queens Wharf in Wellington, with the other 16 crew members at a Wellington quarantine facility onshore.
There are also four new historical cases - all of whom are also in managed isolation facilities.
Later in the day, the Health Ministry released a statement saying the preliminary results show three crew members of the Playa Zahara fishing vessel have the Delta variant of Covid-19.
The ministry said the results of whole genome sequencing also show the variant is not linked to any previously confirmed cases in this country. Nor is it linked to cases on the Viking Bay, which is currently quarantined in Wellington.
The Playa Zahara is currently on its way to Lyttelton and 13 of the crew will be moved to a quarantine facility in Christchurch. Five will remain on board to maintain the vessel.
Quarantine-free travel from Victoria to New Zealand has been paused from 7am today for at least four days and Melbourne went into a five-day lockdown at midnight.
Yesterday there were no new cases of Covid-19 in the community and five new cases in MIQ.