WELLINGTON, New Zealand (CU)_New Zealand on Monday (Jan 25), confirmed its first case of COVID-19 within the community in more than two months.
According to Health officials, the 56-year-old patient who returned to New Zealand on December 30, had tested positive after leaving a two-week mandatory quarantine where she had twice tested negative.
New Zealand’s COVID-19 response minister Chris Hipkins said the woman had tested positive for the South African strain of the virus, but her close contacts had so far tested negative.
He added that since no other infections have been reported from the community in months, the source of the recent infection was probably a fellow returnee at the quarantine facility, and therefore, authorities are looking at whether the virus was spreading through the ventilation and air conditioning systems in these facilities.
The country’s Health Chief Ashley Bloomfield said while the patient’s closest contacts, her husband and hairdresser, had tested negative for the virus, 15 other people have also been identified as close contacts and are being contacted by the authorities.
The woman had quarantined in a managed isolation facility in Auckland, which reported several highly virulent COVID-19 cases in the recent weeks.
New Zealand has been one of the most successful developed nations in controlling the spread of the virus, with less than 2300 infections reported since the beginning of the pandemic.
Tough lockdown measures and geographical isolation enabled the country of 5 million to virtually eliminate the novel Coronavirus within its borders.
However, with the pandemic raging globally, and more people are returning with infections, authorities have expressed their concern regarding the possibility of the virus spreading within the community once again.
