10 Mar 2021

Three new Covid cases found at Fiji border

5:50 pm on 10 March 2021

Fiji has recorded three new border quarantine cases of Covid-19.

Nadi International Airport in Fiji.

Nadi International Airport in Fiji. Photo: Supplied/Fiji Airports

The Health Ministry said the first two cases included two women - a 69-year-old and 39-year-old - who travelled from California in the US , arriving on a flight from Los Angeles on March 1.

The ministry said both women showed no symptoms of the coronavirus when they arrived at Nadi Airport.

It said one of the women returned a weak positive result and was considered a historical case.

Both have been transferred to the isolation ward at Lautoka hospital.

It said the third case was a 44-year-old man who arrived in Fiji on a yacht from Papua New Guinea on 6 March.

The ministry said the man had returned a weak positive test result while undergoing the mandatory 14-day isolation onboard his vessel at the quarantine mooring in Nadi.

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Vaccine rollout begins

Meanwhile, Fiji's vaccination campaign rollout got underway this morning with 6,000 front-line workers first to receive the AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine.

A consignment of 12,000 doses of the vaccine arrived in Fiji last weekend.

The group includes officials from the health ministry, airport, Customs department, airline, Air Traffic Services, hotel sector, military and police.

Fiji is expected to received 108,000 doses of the vaccines this year, the government said.

Fiji now has 66 cases with seven active cases all in border quarantine.

The ministry said the country has not recorded a Covid case outside of quarantine since the first case was reported on March 19, 2020.

It said as of 8 March, 2021, there were seven cases admitted at the Lautoka Hospital isolation ward.

Out of the 66 cases, there have been 57 recoveries and two deaths, it said.

The ministry said the latest 48 cases were international travel-associated cases detected in border quarantine.

It said it had been 324 days since the last case was detected outside border quarantine on April 18, 2020.

Meanwhile, a total of 32,164 laboratory tests had been conducted by the ministry with a daily average of 239 tests a day over the last seven days.

The ministry said there was also a weekly average of 1476 tests a week over the last two weeks.