[Source: RNZ]

There are 162 new community cases of COVID-19 in New Zealand today.

In a statement, the Ministry of Health said of the new cases, 156 are in Auckland, five in Waikato and one in Northland.

There are also four new cases at the border.

The ministry said 53 people are in hospital, down from 56 yesterday – 15 in North Shore, 19 in Middlemore and 19 in Auckland.

Today more than 3.1 million New Zealanders are now fully vaccinated, the ministry said.

It said it would highlight how many New Zealanders were vaccinated rather than the number of community cases to ” better reflect the shift in New Zealand’s current response to COVID-19 and the importance of vaccination”.

There were more than 20,000 vaccines administered yesterday taking NZ’s vaccination rate to 88 percent for first doses and 75 percent for second doses representing 3,159,301 fully vaccinated New Zealanders.

New Zealand had 303 cases over the weekend including Saturday’s 160 new infections which was a record for the pandemic.

There was no media conference at 1pm, with Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern due to hold a briefing at 4pm to announce Cabinet’s decision on whether alert levels for Auckland and parts of Waikato will be eased.

The next stage within alert level 3 would be ‘step 2’ where retail could operate and public facilities like pools, libraries and museums reopen, subject to mask-wearing and social distancing.

Ardern told Morning Report she would be sharing more details on COVID-19 modelling which suggests a rise in case numbers which would peak at 200 per day this month.