National Health Advisory - Notification of Change to Case Definitions for COVID-19

FOR THE ATTENTION OF:
1)        Medical Officers of Health
2)        Chief Medical Officer
3)        Director of Nursing
4)        Relevant clinical and non-clinical staff in your DHB
5)        GP Liaison Officers
6)        Communications Managers
7)       Any other deemed necessary by your organisation

This advisory has been sent separately to Healthline, Plunketline, GPNZ, RNZCGP, NHCC National Close Contact Service, RNZCUC

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ACTIONS:
Forward internally within your organisation as per the 'forward required' above
PHU Managers to please forward to Medical Officers of Health who may not be on the distribution list above.
Please forward to your primary care contacts including: general practitioners, pharmacists and primary health organisations in your region.

ADVISORY SUMMARY:

Dear colleagues,
Following a number of your queries and questions received yesterday, the TAG this morning reviewed the latest case definition and recommended some amendments to the suspect case definition, and clarified the case definition for a probable case of COVID-19. Please find attached below a document outlining these changes. This will be updated on the Ministry of Health website shortly.

Thank you for all the work you are doing to protect the health of all New Zealanders.
Jane Kelley
Health Systems Director, COVID-19 Response
Ministry of Health
New Zealand