Two more die, new cases drop in top of south

Two more people with Covid-19 have died in the top of the south but new case numbers and hospitalisations continue to trend down.

The deaths were reported on Saturday and yesterday in Nelson-Marlborough as part of the Ministry of Health updates.

Nationally, there were nine deaths reported yesterday. Apart from the NelsonMarlborough death, one was from the Auckland region; one from Waikato; two from Bay of Plenty; one from Lakes and three from the Canterbury region.

One person was in their 50s; one in their 60s; one in their 70s; one in their 80s and five people were over 90. The deaths were reported over the past nine days. Delays to reporting can be associated with people dying with Covid-19, rather than from the virus, and it being discovered only after they have died, the ministry said.

On Saturday, 19 deaths were reported nationally over the past seven days.

New case numbers in Nelson Marlborough yesterday totalled 224, down from 294 new cases reported on Saturday and 317 in the top of the south on Friday.

In Nelson Marlborough yesterday there were six people in hospital, compared with nine on Saturday and 11 on Friday.

Nine people with Covid-19 had died, while there were 490 hospitalisations and 5662 new community cases, Ministry of Health figures showed yesterday. The number of new community cases, averaged over the past seven days, was 8435, up on last Sunday’s figure of 8170. The average age of current hospitalisations was 60. On Saturday, there were 7930 new community cases of Covid-19, and 19 people had died with Covid, including two people under the age of 9 and one person in their 20s.