August 29 2021
There are 83 Covid community cases today, taking the total cases in the outbreak to 511. The number is similar to the total reported yesterday - and officials and experts will be hoping this signals that the country's Delta outbreak might be at a plateau.
A record number of vaccinations against Covid-19 were delivered to people across the region last week as immunisation efforts ramped up.
The Bay of Plenty Times earlier reported that while the region's District Health Board was ahead of its vaccination target overall, it had missed weekly targets forthe past seven weeks.
However, Bay of Plenty DHB incident controller Trevor Richardson said things had taken a turn for the better in the second week of lockdown.
"The tremendous work of our healthcare workforce and the response of our community has resulted in record numbers of vaccinations being administered across the Bay of Plenty almost every day this week."
For the first four days of this week, a total of 11,396 doses of the Pfizer vaccine were administered, with all days reaching or close to 3000 doses. The DHB planned to give 15,250 vaccines by August 29.
"On Tuesday, our teams administered over 3000 vaccines, and most sites across the district are fully booked at the moment.
"That's a great sign, but we also want to reassure people that there is enough vaccine and appointments for everyone as we continue to increase capacity across our region."
It comes as general practices and pharmacies have joined the vaccine rollout taking the total number of community providers across the Bay to 36.
Richardson said the health board's vaccination programme was expanding at "rapid pace".
"We are really pleased that the number of Māori receiving the vaccine is also increasing, and we encourage everyone to check with their kaumātua and kuia, parents, aunties and uncles, cousins, and friend and whānau, if they have booked. STORY CONTINUES AFTER LIVE BLOG
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"Getting the vaccine is one of the ways that we can protect ourselves and our whanau against Covid-19."
Twelve general practices, two in the Eastern Bay and 10 in the Western Bay, will be providing the vaccine to their patients while a further 21 pharmacies have expressed interest in providing vaccinations.
Three are in the Eastern Bay, with the remainder in the Western Bay.
Richardson said all information on vaccine providers could be found on the Healthpoint website.
"The advice for residents is if in doubt, to contact their GP as more and more vaccination providers are coming onstream as we move forward with the vaccination rollout programme."
