The units did not often use the National Close Contact Tracing Centre, nor the government's tracing software, which delayed their ability to identify clusters. Photo: Getty ImagesThe ability to identify Covid-19 clusters during the height of the outbreak was a "significant point of weakness" for the country's 12 public health units (PHU), an independent review has found. The Allen & Clarke report, commissioned by the Ministry of Health following the highly critical Verrall report into contact tracing, also found Hawke's Bay's Public Health Unit's management of the Ruby Princess cluster was "haphazard." This is because the units did not often use the National Close Contact Tracing Centre, nor the government's tracing software, which delayed their ability to identify clusters. "The current approach to identifying clusters relies heavily on individual knowledge of the staff in the PHU Incident Response team.

Source: Otago Daily Times June 24, 2020 05:15 UTC