Parishioners at St Mary's Church in Papakura have gone into self-isolation after sharing a cup with the infected man.
Parishioners at St Mary's Church in Papakura have gone into self-isolation after sharing a cup with the infected man.
Five parishioners at St Mary's Church in Papakura may have been exposed to the coronavirus after sharing a chalice of wine with a man who later tested positive for Covid-19.
The man, in his 60s, became the sixth confirmed case of Covid-19 in New Zealand after coming backfrom New Jersey in the United States.
He attended mass at St Mary's Catholic Church Papakura at 8.30am on March 8, before beginning to feel ill on March 10.
The Ministry of Health says the man called ahead to his Papakura GP who tested him in the carpark on March 12, wearing full protective gear. A positive test was returned the next day and the man has been at home in self-isolation since.
Parish priest Father Peter Murphy confirmed five people in his congregation had drunk wine from the same chalice as Patient 6. The man had been serving as a Eucharistic minister - a lay person who helps a priest to deliver consecrated bread and wine for Holy Communion - at the 8.30am mass two Sundays ago.
After the man's test came back positive on Friday, "there was a lot of panic".
"Someone came to me wanting to know where he was sitting - the man's employer had automatically stood him down for a week."
The church normally sees about 800 people through its doors over the three Sunday masses but last weekend that plummeted to 150-200, Murphy said.
"It was quite eerie."
The collection had also been significantly diminished, he said - joking that the infected man might be asked to make up the difference.
Health authorities had advised that only those who had taken the cup with Patient 6 needed to self-isolate. They were all being monitored daily and had no symptoms, while the man in question was also fine, Murphy said.
Although Murphy had been in reasonably close contact with the man, he was not considered at any risk as the man had been asymptomatic at the time.
Communion is a church ritual going back to Jesus' last supper with his disciples, where they ate bread and wine together, Murphy said. Each Sunday people are offered blessed bread and wine, representing the body and blood of Jesus.
The wine has a high alcohol content - around 18 per cent - and the cup is wiped and turned before being offered to the next person to improve hygiene.
However the Catholic Church has directed that nobody should be sipping wine from a communal chalice or shaking hands.
"We have a ritual, the Sign of the Peace, before communion where people greet one another - now we just do the namaste or some of us wave," Murphy said. "Namaste is beautiful."
A few parishioners also took communion on the tongue but that was no longer happening, he said.
"Normally when people come into a Catholic church there's a holy water font at the door, they bless themselves in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost - it's really a reminder of baptism. That's been emptied and sanitiser put in [its] place."
Murphy had not blessed the sanitiser.
Catholics often bring communion to sick or elderly people in rest homes but many are now banning visitors from outside, Murphy said.
