The number of new covid-19 cases reported for Central Otago is 27, down from Friday when there were 36 new positive cases.

Southern District Health Board (SDHB) said there were 236 active covid-19 cases in Central, a drop from 299 total cases on May 20.

Ministry of Health figures for Southern for the past 24 hours are 659 new covid-19 cases and a total of 3943 cases (not recovered from the last seven days).

Thirty-three people were in hospital in Southern at 8am on May 24. Sixteen people were in Dunedin (two of those in ICU), 14 in Southland and three people were in Waitaki hospital. No one in Southland or Waitaki was in ICU or being ventilated.

Dunedin has 323 new cases, Queenstown-Lakes 87, Invercargill 85, Waitaki 48, Southland 40, Clutha 28 and Gore 20.

Across New Zealand, the Ministry of Health reported another 15 deaths of people with covid-19. Three of these deaths were from Southern.

For anyone who has symptoms or is a household contact of a confirmed covid positive case, it is best to request rapid antigen tests (RATs) via the Ministry of Health's RAT Requestor website.

SDHB has moved to send out covid-19 Southern numbers on Tuesdays and Fridays, The Central App will continue to update readers and our community on covid-19 as we receive reports.

Map of cases covid-19 in the Southern district May 24, 2022. PHOTO: Southern District Health Board

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