LOCKDOWN EXTENDED AS CLUSTER SPREADS

New Zealand’s renewed coronavirus outbreak has spread beyond Auckland, the government revealed Friday as lockdown measures were extended for another 12 days.

Despite a strict quarantine imposed in an effort to contain the virus in the city, two cases have been detected in the North Island town of Tokoroa, 209 kilometres to the south, Chris Hipkins, the health minister, said.

Overall, 12 more cases of community transmission have been confirmed while a 13th is suspected, Hipkins said — bringing the total number to 30.

Masked police have sealed off roads out of Auckland in an attempt to control the outbreak, three months after New Zealand declared itself virus-free. The discovery that it has leaked out of the city is therefore a particularly hard blow to the official strategy.

But Hipkins sought to dismiss fears that COVID-19 could now be rampant elsewhere, insisting that despite the distance, the cases were all part of the same Auckland cluster.

Earlier, Jacinda Ardern, the prime minister, said signs indicated that outbreak was identified relatively early.