Phil says he understands there will be apprehension in the community, but they need to be kind and considerate of those affected.
"My heart really goes out to those affected. I know we have a great community that sticks together and we need that now to be kind, and also follow the rules of mask-wearing, contact tracing and getting vaccinated to protect ourselves and the community."
Taranaki DHB medical officer of health Jonathan Jarman says Covid-19 infection in children tends to be milder than in adults and children can often have no symptoms at all.
"The real issue is children can pass on the infection to their brothers, sisters and adults in the family. We expect to see more cases emerge in the next few days."
This is going to be a tough time for families as the isolation time will be over the Christmas period, he says.
"All the children were too young to be vaccinated so will be considered to be infectious for two weeks. Some families will need to isolate for three to four weeks at least. The community needs to wrap their support around them as it's going to be tough. There are likely to be locations of interest all over Taranaki."
Locations of interest, linked to the public and considered high risk, will be published on the Ministry of Health's website whenever they are identified.
Dr Jarman says if people are sick, to ring Healthline and get a Covid-19 test, stay home until test results are negative and you've been well for at least 24 hours.
He says the contact tracing team has found contact tracing to be much easier if people use their Covid-19 tracer app on their phones.
At this stage, contact tracers have been unable to find where the original person in Eltham caught their infection.
Dr Jarman says it's hoped that genome sequencing of the positive test will give clues to where the virus came from.
More than 800 Covid-19 tests were completed throughout Taranaki since the first case in Eltham was announced Saturday evening.
With the Taranaki Covid-19 response growing, the DHB, iwi, Māori health providers, primary care and the Ministry of Social Development are all working together to ensure health and welfare needs are supported.
The ability to deliver so much testing has been pivotal on the efforts of Ngāti Ruanui and their saliva testing and Ngāruahine supporting pop-up clinics.
Dr Jarman says vaccination is our best protection against the virus.
"We expect further cases in our region with the country having more freedoms to move around so please don't delay getting your vaccinations."
