There are 1929 new community cases in New Zealand today and 73 in hospital.
There are 58 new cases in the Bay of Plenty District Health Board area and nine in the Lakes District Health Board area.
There are two cases in Rotorua Hospital and two in Tauranga Hospital.
There are several new locations of interest for the region.
Air NZ Flight NZ5804 Christchurch to Tauranga on Wednesday, February 9, between 12pm and 2pm is a high-risk location of interest.
Anyone on this flight, seated on rows 13 to 17 needs to self-isolate, test immediately and on day five after exposure.
The Ministry of Health said it was very important that people only get tested if they had cold or flu symptoms, been identified as a close contact of a case or had been asked to get tested by a health official.
"Unnecessary testing is resulting in long waits at testing centres and could also delay results for those who urgently need them," the ministry said.
A teacher at a Western Bay of Plenty childcare centre has tested positive for Covid-19, prompting the closure of the centre.
The teacher, who works at BestStart Ōmokoroa, tested positive for the virus on Wednesday, BestStart Deputy CEO Fiona Hughes confirmed.
"BestStart immediately made arrangements to close the centre and are working with the Ministry of Education and Public Health on the steps that need to be taken," Hughes said.
This is the third exposure at a BestStart centre in the past month.
Westbrook School principal Colin Watkins told the Rotorua Daily Post he was notified of the cases on Thursday morning by family members.
Two classes had been sent home and were now isolating, he said.
"We consider all of those kids in the class to be close contacts. They have all gone home and they are isolating."
The school remains open and Watkins had made contact with parents this morning, he said.
"We are putting all the necessary procedures in today ourselves. We are just going to monitor it on a daily basis."
He said prior to finding out about the cases students had been learning in "year level bubbles" and separated during class and break times.
"We are trying not to have the kids mixing so there is no cross-contamination at morning tea and lunch. We are hoping to contain within those two classes."
Rotorua Girls' High School also had students isolating after a student at school last week tested positive for Covid-19.
More than 40 students and about three staff members were close contacts.
Meanwhile, University of Otago professor Michael Baker said the trend of rising case numbers was exactly what was expected and indicated the outbreak could peak in March.
"[It has been] three weeks since community transmission was really established in New Zealand and we saw that initial uptick in cases," Baker told the New Zealand Herald.
"The moving average of cases has not deviated from a steeply rising exponential curve where numbers are doubling maybe every five days roughly, give or take a day or two.
"If that trend continued from the current numbers, we could be hitting 10,000 cases a day by early March.
"That's why we will need all of the tools we have available just to try and dampen that rise in cases. We may do a bit better than that if all New Zealanders really do their best to get their boosters, to get tested and isolate, and to limit transmission by using masks indoors and limiting their social gatherings."
However, Baker said even if we did reach the 10,000 predicted cases, we may not actually see them due to a lack of testing capacity.
"We will need to think about other tools, [such as] much higher availability of rapid antigen tests," Baker said. Certain locations such as hospitals could test people, as Middlemore is doing, as a way of detecting infections in the community.
Auckland was about two to three weeks ahead of the rest of the country in terms of case numbers, Baker said.
"It's going to mean that we will see at a national level a peak that actually includes peaking at different places at different times."
Drive-through vaccinations will be held on Saturday at Tauranga's Trustpower Baypark from 10am to 3.30pm, and at Kawerau's Ron Hardie Recreation Centre from 10am to 3pm, the Bay of Plenty DHB said.
On Sunday, a pop-up vaccination clinic will be at Tauranga's Fraser Cove Shopping Centre from 10am to 3pm.
First and second doses, boosters and vaccinations for children aged five and older are all available at these events.
A protester taking part in the occupation at Parliament says nothing's going to change until politicians come out and address the people.
Speaker Trevor Mallard released a statement yesterday, outlining the terms of engagement for MPs.
He said they will not speak with protesters until all illegally parked vehicles are cleared, tents are removed, and the intimidation towards Wellingtonians is stopped.
It comes as Wellington leaders renew calls for an immediate end to the protest, now in day 11 of its occupation at Parliament.
Police reveal the identity of Tauranga pedestrian fatality injured in Pyes Pa crash.