4. Question No. 4—HealthDr SHANE RETI (National—Whangarei) to the Minister of HealthQuestion No. 4—Health4. Dr SHANE RETI (National—Whangarei) to the Minister of Health: What was the testing capacity for coronavirus tests in Auckland immediately prior to the current spike from 8 August to 11 August inclusive and how many tests were done in Auckland on each of those four days?Hon CHRIS HIPKINS (Minister of Health): The national capacity of the labs that serviced the Auckland region DHBs from 8 August to 11 August inclusive was an average of 11841 tests per day with a high of 12744 on both 10 and 11 August. The combined number of tests completed across the three Auckland DHBs for each of these three days was 1696 on 8 August 925 on 9 August 1054 on 10 August and 1994 on 11 August. I would note that those dates include a weekend when we do see lower testing numbers. The testing capacity has always been there and it's been able to scale up quickly to meet demand. So since 12 August more than 9400 people on average have been tested per day.Dr Shane Reti: How does he explain answers to written questions that suggest the index case sample that started the current spike was received by the laboratory at 21.41 on Monday 10 August and then took 18 hours to report a positive result the following Tuesday afternoon; and did that 18 hours cause a delay for how quickly contact tracing could be started?Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: I'm not familiar with those exact numbers but no I don't believe there was a delay. So I'd have to go back and double-check that.Dr Shane Reti: Would health officials have been more successful at containing the latest outbreak and minimising the lockdown if reporting of the index case lab test which normally takes around 3½ hours had occurred on the day the sample arrived at the lab and not reported 18 hours later?Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: Not necessarily.Dr Shane Reti: Does he believe that 18 hours is an acceptable delay for a positive coronavirus test to be processed once it arrives at the lab given that every hour a positive case goes undetected the risk in the community increases?Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: It would depend on the number of test results being processed at the lab. Given the number of test results in question there that kind of delay would be—if that's what it was there would have to be another reason than simply there being too many test results to be processed. We did see up to a 48-hour delay during the peak when we were getting sort of 20000-plus tests per day being processed. Of course it may have been that that test result was processed on a weekend though.Dr Shane Reti: How does he explain answers to written questions which show a case in managed isolation in Auckland that same day as the index case—Monday 10 August—where the sample was received by the laboratory at 4.51 p.m. several hours earlier than the index case and then took 30 hours to report the positive result at 11 p.m. the next day?Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: That would really be a question for the labs.Rt Hon Jacinda Ardern: Can he confirm that the case which was initially reported and although not the primary cause of the outbreak—that case that was initially reported—was collected via a GP and then of course transported to a lab before being reported and that at the time of testing there was no suggestion from the Ministry of Health that there were any delays in testing because of course they were well below what is our actual testing capacity at the time?Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: Yes and I can say that the GP test results at that point were not being prioritised in the way that say managed isolation test results were being processed because there was a lower risk.