There are 7050 new community cases of Covid-19 in New Zealand today.
And the Ministry of Health has today reported a further 24 Covid-related deaths.
There are 361 people in hospital with the virus, including 14 in intensive care.
Of today's deaths, 12 people died in the past four days while the other 12 have died since April 25, officials say.
Today's reported deaths take the total number of publicly reported deaths with Covid-19 to 1267.
The seven-day rolling average of reported deaths is 12.
Three people were in their 50s, two in their 60s, five in 70s; seven in their 80s and seven were aged over 90.
Ten were women and 14 were men.
Meanwhile, the Ministry of Health's chief science adviser Dr Ian Town has provided detail on surveillance measures used for monitoring new variants of Covid-19 in New Zealand.
Town says the international situation for Covid-19 is further waves of Omicron continue and "New Zealand has been experiencing exactly the same thing with additional sub-variants being detected here over recent weeks".
"Once we detect a variant here in New Zealand, it does take some time to gain a appreciation of the severity and the outcome for individual patients.
"There is a small chance that a more aggressive variant may be found in New Zealand [...] that's where our international intelligence plays an important part," Town said.
He said previously we were working to an elimination strategy but in December last year that changed and we were now working Covid-19 protection framework.
"We are currently in the orange setting which is about protection and surveillance ... those settings are reviewed regularly by our public health and science colleagues who take a look around for international evidence to assess how appropriate these settings are at any given time.
"The director-general has assessed the current orange setting as being appropriate for this stage of the outbreaks," Town said.
He said reviews were now being done every month and the next review was timetabled for next week.
"Although we have experienced quite a peak of cases earlier this year, case numbers remain relatively high," he said.
Town said there was concern among the medical fraternity that there may be long-term effects on organ systems from Covid "but we don't have New Zealand data on that yet".
"We are developing guidelines (for long Covid) and we hope to release those in July," Town said.
The ministry's chief testing adviser Kirsten Beynon said prioritising the health of all New Zealanders and a commitment to an evidence-level response has been critical to our success to date.
"While we have moved away from elimination and capturing every single case, it is important we continue to identify trends and case numbers both at a local and national level."
She said addition we need to monitor which variants are coming into New Zealand and spreading through our communities.
"We survey travellers entering New Zealand, individuals and wastewater in our communities and those who are sickest in our hospitals and we triangulate this information to understand the collective burden of disease," Beynon said.
She said many countries have stopped testing at our borders and others, like Canada have moved to randomised sampling of vaccinated travellers.
In New Zealand, she said, people crossing our border are tested twice after they arrive.
"While this is reliant on self-reporting, the numbers are encouraging. For example, of the 37,000 people who arrived in New Zealand in the week ending 5th June, 75 per cent completed a reported two RATs. Of the people tested, approximately 2.3 per cent were positive for Covid-19."
About a third of these positive new arrivals were getting PCR testing to give additional information on new variants and subvariants that are circulating, Beynon said.
"It is important that when people arrive in New Zealand they have RAT tests and if positive they seek a PSR follow up," she said.
"Currently, we are building on our genome testing to make sure information is readily available for all New Zealanders," Beynon said.
The ministry's lead science adviser Dr Fiona Callaghan said NZ's surveillance system was part of an international effort to track the impact and spread of Covid-19.
At the border, officials were focused on catching new variants, Callaghan said.
In hospitals, the goal was to check which patients had Covid-19 and to monitor new variants that may be responsible for more severe disease, Callaghan said.
Currently, the BA2 variant is responsible for more than 95 per cent of reported cases in New Zealand with new variants such as BA4 and BA5 beginning to show increasing prevalence
The BA1 variant had previously been the dominant strain in the country, Callaghan said.
"Wastewater testing has been crucial to our monitoring, now it's used to measures of virus in the community and information of the overall trend whether the outbreak is growing or slowing," Callaghan said.
"Obviously Covid is not going away. It's a continual challenge for us," Town said.
"We are continuing responding and adapting to new information."
"Winter is always busy for our health providers and we are already seeing increased pressure and it may get worse," Town said.
New Zealand might see outbreaks of measles and whooping cough as immunities might be low, he said.
"We have extended the eligibility for the free flu vaccinations but there has been a supply issue so making it more available may not have been possible this year," Town said.
"Vaccination is the best protection.
"If you are unwell it's important to stay home."
He encouraged people who test positive for Covid-19 to be vigilant in uploading that information.
"Anyone with symptoms of Covid within 90 days of testing positive should be talking to their doctor," Town said.
Callaghan said the number of RATs that get reported are lower than the number of Covid community cases, which was why wastewater testing was important.
Town said monkeypox had been the subject of active discussion among NZ science teams and public health colleagues.
"We are following those international developments really closely.
"As you probably know one of the larger outbreaks has occurred in Britain with about 300 cases so far.
"We are aware cases have been detected in Australia and you may recall that Cabinet yesterday decided to make it a notifiable diseases so if we do detect cases here, we think our normal case identification, contact tracing and isolation will be the best first approach to stop it spreading more rapidly," Town said.
When asked if there was enough capacity in the system to cope with monkeypox, Town said "if the numbers stay relatively low as they have down in Australia and the UK, then absolutely".
The seven-day rolling average of community case numbers today is 6035. Last Wednesday it was 6893.
Today's new cases are in Northland (209), Auckland (1962), Waikato (508), Bay of Plenty (271), Lakes (116), Hawke's Bay (201), MidCentral (314), Whanganui (106), Taranaki (204), Tairāwhiti (30), Wairarapa (64), Capital and Coast (620), Hutt Valley (325), Nelson Marlborough (280), Canterbury (1,075), South Canterbury (93), Southern (587), West Coast (82), unknown (3).
In total, there are 42,233 cases active in the community.
Since the beginning of the pandemic, there has been 1,207,717 Covid cases in New Zealand.
The average age of those in hospital with the virus is 61.
The ministry is reporting 70 new imported cases.
In the last 24 hours, 2825 PCR tests and 13,413 rapid antigen tests were processed.
Yesterday, 32 first doses, 47 second doses, 33 third primary doses, 955 booster doses, 52 paediatric first doses and 274 paediatric second doses of the vaccine were administered.
Last Friday, the ministry reported four cases of BA.5 and one case of BA.4 - the first time each of the Omicron subvariants have been detected in the community without a clear link to the border.
There have since been no further reports of more of these variants in the community.
Epidemiologist Michael Baker said the new variants were likely to lead to a second Omicron wave.
Baker said the variants were more infectious and had caused new waves overseas.
Multiple cases of the BA.2.12.1 Omicron subvariant have also been detected in the community.
Meanwhile, as Covid and winter illnesses hit, an Auckland primary school has reverted back to mask wearing.
This week, Grey Lynn Primary School asked all students in Year 4 and up to wear masks indoors, and are encouraging younger students to mask up also.
A newsletter from the board of trustees said five staff had tested positive for Covid-19 in the past fortnight, and many students were also isolating.
Grey Lynn's board chairman Stewart Reynolds told the Herald the decision was about Covid and increasing rates of other winter illnesses.
"It's all about keeping the school open as long as possible, keeping the children learning, seeing them happy. Because they love being back."
Today, Health Minister Andrew Little announced that the Government is introducing a bill to amend legislation so hundreds of thousands of vulnerable people can access a second Covid-19 booster.
Late last month, Covid-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins announced plans to roll out a second booster dose to people who were at high risk of getting very sick from Covid-19 but signalled that legislative changes were needed.
Little said the bill would go to the Health select committee and be reported back on June 20, and would be considered by the House again that week.
The booster was voluntary and the amendment would allow all vaccinators to administer the dose without a prescription.
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