Three more people with Covid-19 died in Fiji in the last 24 hours, one of them the youngest patient since the pandemic reached the country in March 2020.
The two others had tested positive for Covid-19 and doctors are yet to determine whether it was the cause of death.
Photo: NOBEASTSOFIERCE/Science Photo Library via AFP
Excluding the two being investigated, there have been 14 deaths, with 12 from this April outbreak alone.
Eight other people, who tested positive to covid, have died from pre-existing illnesses.
Fiji's total case count of the current outbreak of the highly contagious Delta variant now stands at 2,363 after another 215 cases were recorded between 8pm Thursday and 8am Frida. Fiji's test positivity ratio is at 6.3 percent.
Health Secretary James Fong also announced on Friday there has now been 3,063 cases since March 2020 and 2,993 of that was from these last eight weeks alone.
The latest confirmed death from covid was a 34-year-old woman from Nadawa, a suburb 10km outside of the capital Suva, who was declared dead on arrival at the Colonial War Memorial Hospital. The woman had no known pre-existing medical conditions and had not been vaccinated.
Meanwhile, only three of Friday's new cases are from outside of the central eastern division, two cases are from the district of Nawaka in Nadi, and one is a nurse at the Natabua Quarantine Facility in Lautoka.
The remaining 212 cases are from Suva and adjacent towns Lami, Nasinu and Nausori. While there are 101 cases are from existing clusters, 18 cases are from new areas such as the Flour Mills of Fiji a large manufacturer of food items, New World Supermarket in Nasinu, the Police Medical unit in Suva and the Our Lady of Nazareth home for retired nuns in Wailoku, outside Suva.
"The seven-day average of new cases per day has increased to 203 cases per day or 230 cases per million population per day. Our daily testing numbers have remained at a high level, and yet our test positivity continues to increase. All the evidence is that there is widespread community transmission in the Lami-Suva-Nausori containment zone," Dr Fong said.
There are also clusters in Naitasiri and one cluster in Korovou. There continues to be cases reported in Nadi, but so far they are from within the containment zone in the Nawajikuma, Nawakalevu, and Tramline containment areas.
"The remaining cases are contacts of known cases that were seen in screening clinics and were swabbed, and cases under investigation to determine possible sources of transmission."
The Health Ministry has administered first doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine to 46 percent of Fiji's adults, which is 272,354 people, and 6.5 percent or 38,031 people are now fully vaccinated.
