A timeline of Covid-19 as the number of confirmed cases increases around the world.
New Zealand is still Covid-free despite 7.2 million cases and now 411,000 deaths globally - including almost 2 million cases in the US.
It is the 19th day of no new cases in New Zealand and the third day the country has had no active cases.
The situation contrasts wildly with the rest of the world. The number of new daily cases of Covid-19 globally hit a record high on Sunday, the World Health Organisation said.
The UN agency warned the pandemic appeared to be worsening, and has urged countries that had seen improvement to remain vigilant.
Director General of Health Ashley Bloomfield has stopped giving daily updates and instead his Ministry will send releases. Photo / Mark Mitchell
"More than 100,000 cases have been reported on nine of the past 10 days," WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said at a briefing this week. "Yesterday, more than 136,000 cases were reported – the most in a single day so far."
The WHO recently deemed South America the "new epicentre" for infections, with Brazil leading the continent in cases.
Brazil alone currently has the world's second-highest number of cases after the United States, with over 670,000 people infected since the pandemic began.
In New Zealand, nine significant clusters have now closed, an increase of one from yesterday. The most recent closure is an Auckland community cluster.
In a press release today, the Ministry of Health said there had been 2631 tests processed, bringing the total number of tests performed to 298,532.
The ministry will release an update of its Covid Tracer app this evening which will allow users to get a notification if they were at a venue with someone who later tested positive.
Users will also be able to send their digital diary to contact tracers if required and will have a vibrate mode so visually impaired people will know if a QR scan has worked.
The app will automatically update unless updates have been disabled on the users' phone.
About 541,000 people have now dowloaded the up - 6000 more than yesterday - and 45,497 businesses have QR codes at their doors.
The total number of poster scans to date is 816,612.
Bloomfield's new profile
When asked what he would do with his new public profile yesterday, Bloomfield said: "I was just doing my job."
For anyone who wants to keep seeing Bloomfield they could go to Te Papa, which is now displaying artwork of him, he joked.
Bloomfield said Kiwis should "have a dance if the mood takes them" now we're in level 1.
"We've done the hard mahi here and the work has paid off."
There was a "weak positive" test yesterday in Auckland but a second test was negative and the person was found to have a different illness, said Bloomfield.
Our total number of confirmed cases remains at 1154, which is the number the country reports to the World Health Organisation.
