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Director of health Ashley Bloomfield (Illustration: Simon Chesterman)
Director of health Ashley Bloomfield (Illustration: Simon Chesterman)

SocietyApril 16, 2020

Covid-19: New Zealand cases mapped and charted, April 16

Director of health Ashley Bloomfield (Illustration: Simon Chesterman)
Director of health Ashley Bloomfield (Illustration: Simon Chesterman)

The latest in our series of charts, graphics and data visualisations by Chris McDowall. David Garcia helped create today’s charts.

This work is entirely funded by the generosity of The Spinoff Members

These posts collate the most recent statistics and present them as charts and maps. The Ministry of Health typically publishes data updates in the early afternoon, which describe the situation at 9am on the day of release. These data visualisations are interactive – use your mouse or thumb to hover over each graph for more detail.

Note for users of The Spinoff app: if the charts below are not appearing, please update your app to the latest version.

This afternoon’s Ministry of Health figures report that the total number of confirmed and probable Covid-19 cases stands at 1,401 (1,084 confirmed and 317 probable). A total of 770 people have recovered, an increase of 42 since yesterday. There were six new confirmed cases reported in the last 24 hours and nine new probable cases. No further deaths have been reported.

The number of significant clusters with 10 or more cases remains at 16. There are 12 people in hospital which is one fewer than yesterday. There are now three people in intensive care units – one each at Middlemore, Dunedin and North Shore hospitals. The Dunedin and North Shore patients are in a critical condition.

Yesterday, 3,661 tests were processed. The ministry reported averaging 2,714 Covid-19 lab tests per day during the week ending April 15 – an average pulled down by relatively low testing during the Easter period. A total of 70,160 lab tests have been conducted since January 22. There are 70,826 test supplies in stock, down from 69,758 yesterday.

This chart compares active and recovered cases. Active cases are confirmed or probable cases of Covid-19 where the person has neither recovered nor died. Recovered cases are people who were once an active case, but are at least 10 days since onset and have not exhibited any symptoms for 48 hours.

For the second day, Ministry of Health statistics show more recovered than active cases. The number of active cases dropped again, from 770 to 622 this morning. The overall downward trend of active case counts that started around April 8 continues.

The Ministry of Health released counts of active, recovered and deceased cases by district health board this afternoon. This table summarises that data, showing how the different types of case are distributed across regions. Note the difference that a geographic lens places on the situation. Bucking the national trend, there are several DHBs where the number of active cases is greater than the count of recovered people. See, for example, Waikato (106 active, 76 recovered), Waitamatā (105 active, 100 recovered), Hawke’s Bay (26 active, 15 recovered) and Northland (18 active, 8 recovered).

The symbol map shows confirmed and probable Covid-19 cases arranged by district health board. In keeping with the relatively small number of new cases, there is minimal change in regional counts. Southern (213), Waitematā (205), Auckland (184) and Waikato (182) remain the four district health boards with the largest number of active cases. The largest increase in cases was in Waitematā (up four to 205).

There are 16 significant clusters under investigation by the Ministry of Health, the same as yesterday. The largest increases were due to cases getting associated with the Bluff wedding (up three to 92 cases) and one of the aged residential care facilities in Auckland (also up three to 18 cases).

I haven’t included this chart since my first day of making these summaries on March 30. That feels like a lifetime ago, but apparently it was just two weeks. There were 455 confirmed and probable cases at the time. Recent overseas travel made up 57% of these cases, compared with 39% today. Contact with a known case was 26% of cases, compared with 39% today. Fifteen percent of cases were under investigation, which has been reduced to 4% today. Confirmed community transmission comprised 2% of cases on both dates.

This chart shows cases according to their original “date of report” rather than the “date the case was classified as confirmed/probable”. This is a subtle but important distinction as there is sometimes a lag between a “potential” case getting updated to “probable” or “confirmed”, yet the date of report stays the same.

The same broad trend that we see in the other charts is evident here. There is a downward trend in the number of cases. Even with a few potential cases getting upgraded to probable or confirmed in recent days, these numbers look promising.

Note that the number of cases reported on a particular date may not match the number of cases reported in the last 24 hours. This is because the number of confirmed and probable cases reported in the last 24 hours includes cases which were entered on an earlier date as “under investigation” or “suspected” whose status has now been changed to confirmed or probable.

Keep going!