Police take over an intersection leading to Parliament on the ninth day of protests against COVID-19 restrictions in Wellington, New Zealand on February 16, 2022, inspired by a similar demonstration in Canada. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has referred to the protests as an "imported" phenomenon and rejected calls to remove all restrictions. Photo: AFP

Managed Isolation and Quarantine (MIQ) is beginning to scale down its operations, COVID-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins said on Thursday as 21,015 new community cases were reported in New Zealand.

"With New Zealand now reopening to the world without the requirement to isolate for most, there is a significantly reduced demand for MIQ. This of course means that we no longer need the number of facilities we currently have," Hipkins said in a statement.

By the end of June, 28 of the current 32 facilities will leave the MIQ network and return to being hotels, he said.

Among the new community infections reported on Thursday, 7,234 were in the largest city Auckland. Fifteen new cases of COVID-19 were detected at the New Zealand border, according to the Ministry of Health.

Currently there are 845 COVID-19 patients in New Zealand hospitals, including 16 people in intensive care units or high dependency units, according to the ministry.

New Zealand has reported 306,919 confirmed cases of COVID-19 since the beginning of the pandemic, including 208,625 cases identified in the past 10 days and not yet classified as recovered.

New Zealand is currently at the highest Red settings under its COVID-19 Protection Framework. At Red settings, face masks become mandatory in many indoor environments and gatherings are limited to 100 people.

Xinhua