Some 90 new community cases have been reported today in Northland, Auckland, Waikato, Bay of Plenty, Lakes and Nelson-Tasman. There are no new cases in Hawke’s Bay, MidCentral, Whanganui or Canterbury.
Daily Delta cases have continued to decline and level out over the past five days to just above where they were in late October before the significant surge after Auckland moved to Level 3 Step 2 and the Waikato and Northland moved to Level 2.
Although the decline is positive, the levelling can indicate the possibility of another surge to follow.
The combination of higher vaccination rates now sitting at over 85% fully vaccinated and the Traffic Light System introduced five days ago appears to be holding. The key question is whether this will hold once the Auckland border opens on December 15.
Māori cases
- Māori were 47 (52.2%) of all new cases today.
- Māori are the highest number of daily cases for 65 of the last 66 days.
- Māori continue to have the highest number of total cases (45.4%), active cases (48.0%), hospitalisations (37.6) and deaths (38.9%).
- There have been 227 new hospitalisations since November 1 of which 112 (49.3%) have been Māori.
- On today's totals, per 100k of population, Māori are 8.0 times more likely to become infected, 6.4 times more likely to be hospitalised and 3.9 times more likely to die than non-Māori/Pacific.
Māori and Pacific cases continue to dominate the outbreak and are regularly over 80% of daily cases.
Adjusting figures for a 45,000 to 70,000 Ministry of Health undercount in the number of vaccine eligible Māori, Māori vaccinations reached 78.7% today. Of these, 67.5% are fully vaccinated. This is 18 percentage points behind the national average of 85.5% fully vaccinated.
Over the two months since October 6, Māori health providers have vaccinated mpe than 152,000 Māori, a 54.7% increase twice the national increase of 27.1%.
The Rangatahi-led Māori vaccination programmes have also gathered further momentum. Since October 30, they have vaccinated 54,000 Maori in the 12-34yrs age group an increase of 61.1% which is more than double the combined increase in all other Māori age cohorts of 28.1%.
Since October 30, the fully vaccinated Māori rate for:
- 65yrs+ has risen 5.3% to 92.3%;
- 50-64yrs risen 12.2% to 82.2%;
- 35-49yrs risen 18.5% to 66.1%;
- 20-34yrs risen 22.9% to 53.6%; and
- 12-19yrs risen 37.6%.
These figures are an impressive testament to the work of Māori health providers and rangatahi leadership in pursuit of protecting whakapapa, whānau and our taiohi-tamariki-mokopuna.
Māori Vaccination by DHB
The Ministry of Health is making regular claims of Māori vaccination reaching the 90% threshold. This is not the case. The figures are unreliable because of the Māori undercount in the Ministry’s figures.
Nevertheless, there is progress. Eleven DHBs have passed the 80% threshold for total Māori vaccinations and eight have passed 70% fully vaccinated.
Current Projection to New Year
On the current overall seven-day rate of 113 cases per day, there will be 12,100 cases by New Year’s Day. On the current seven-day average for Māori of 57 cases per day, 5,600 of these cases will be Māori.
Closing the gap to achieve 90% Māori vaccination before the Auckland border opens on December 15 will not happen. That is the main concern going forward.
Noho haumaru, stay safe.
Dr Rawiri Taonui.