22 new COVID-19 cases have been announced which include 12 cases from Vunivivi Nausori, 7 Navy officers, 2 from Queen Elizabeth Barracks and 1 from Kinoya.
Investigations have revealed that the navy, Waila and Vunivivi clusters are connected through a common exposure event which was a funeral.
Permanent Secretary for Health, Doctor James Fong says the resident of Kinoya has no links to other cases at this early stage of investigation.
Doctor Fong says the 2 new cases at the George Mate Medical Centre at Queen Elizabeth Barracks are connected to the QEB cluster.
He says the 7 naval officers and staff are contacts of the first naval officer to test positive and are part of the navy cluster.
Doctor Fong also says 12 are residents of Vunivivi in Nausori.
They were found as part of screening of that area in connection with the navy cluster.
Doctor Fong says it is clear that the concentration of this outbreak is now in the Suva-Nausori area.
He says most of the new cases in recent days were discovered through contact tracing investigations for known cases, which is an indicator that the contact tracing efforts are effective.
The Permanent Secretary says significant escalations in daily case numbers have been largely driven by the fact that recent cases have been linked to large households or workplace groups, funeral gatherings and the associated grog sessions in big groups.
308 cases have been recorded since March last year with 155 recoveries and 4 deaths.
There have been 238 cases during this current outbreak, and there are now 149 active cases.
Please follow the COVID-19 safety guidelines and avoid unnecessary movements.
16,148 people have received their first doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine since the restart of the COVID-19 vaccination campaign within the Suva and Nausori Containment Zones on Monday.
Permanent Secretary for Health, Doctor James Fong says a total of 13,398 first doses were administered to the people living between Suva to Nausori while 2,750 second doses were given to the frontliners across Fiji.
As of 26th May 2021, 111,801 people in Fiji have received the first dose of COVID-19 vaccine.
This is 17% of the Ministry of Health and Medical Services’ target population of 650,000 individuals.
Please note a daily list of vaccination sites will be released each evening.
Doctor Fong also acknowledges the support of the different government ministries, agencies including RFMF, Fiji Police, civil society groups and ordinary Fijians who have come forward in the successful roll-out of the vaccination program.
The Health Ministry’s Permanent Secretary Dr James Fong says they are reviewing their restrictions in the West and North and will be making more definitive announcements in the next few days.
Dr. Fong says they have received more detailed data regarding the effectiveness of the containment measures in the Northern and Western Divisions.
He says the Lautoka Hospital has ended their 21-day isolation with almost all patients discharged yesterday.
He confirms the hospital has also discharged its last 2 COVID-19 patients as they have recovered.
Dr Fong says with the recovery of these 2 patients there will be 0 active cases in the West, and it has also been 15 days since the last case was reported from that division.
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