The number of new community cases of Covid-19 has jumped after several days of decline, with 20 new cases reported in Auckland today.

There was no press conference today. In a statement, the ministry said 19 of them are family or known contacts and only one of them remains unrelated.

“Discussions are underway with this person to determine how they relate to the current outbreak.”

There are now seven unrelated cases in the past 14 days.

The number of new cases has been slowly declining over the past few days, with 11 new cases reported yesterday and 13 on Thursday.

The ministry said it expected fluctuations in the number of cases at this point in the outbreak.

There have now been a total of 1,027 cases linked to the current outbreak, with 625 of Auckland’s 1,010 cases now considered cured, while all but one of Wellington’s 17 cases have recovered.

Ten people are hospitalized with the coronavirus, including three in intensive care or in HDU.

There have also been two new confirmed cases and two historic cases in managed isolation.

The ministry said testing at high levels in Auckland remained a critical part of the response to the outbreak and continued to urge anyone in Auckland with symptoms of a cold or flu – even if they are benign – to be tested.

He said 12,427 tests were carried out yesterday, including more than 7,000 swabs taken in the Auckland area.

“We have also performed over 1,000 saliva tests since Monday, the majority in the past 48 hours. More than 400 employers will be running saliva tests for nearly 4,500 employees across New Zealand.”