government's "team of 5 million" rhetoric. on 9 september 2021, prime minister ardern confirmed that new zealand had purchased 250,000 extra doses of the pfizer vaccine from spain as part of a deal with spanish prime minister pedro sánchez. the first shipment is due to arrive on 10 september. in addition, ardern confirmed that new zealand would receive 1.8 million pfizer doses throughout the month of september. on 12 september 2021, ardern confirmed that new zealand had purchased 500,000 pfizer doses from denmark as part of a deal with danish prime minister mette frederiksen. the first shipment arrived in the middle of the following week. on 31 march 2022, the fijian government accepted an offer from new zealand to supply 50,000 doses of the pfizer pediatric vaccine to fiji's covid-19 vaccination efforts. february 2021 on 20 february, 100 nurses became the first people in new zealand to receive the pfizer–biontech covid-19 vaccine. healthcare workers, essential workers and those most at risk will be vaccinated in the second quarter of the year. the general population will be vaccinated in the second half of the year. march 2021 on 1 march, 28 port workers at tauranga received their first dose of the pfizer-biontech covid-19 vaccine. on 10 march, covid-19 response minister chris hipkins announced the covid-19 vaccine roll-out plan using the pfizer-biontech covid-19 vaccine. on 26 march, the canterbury district health board was made to take its covid-19 vaccination booking system offline after a security vulnerability was discovered by a member of the public that exposed details of 716 people who had registered to use the system. the person who found the vulnerability labelled the developer of the system incompetent. to date the booking system has not been brought back online. on 29 march, the hawke's bay district health board criticised the health ministry for flaws and delays in the covid-19 vaccination rollout, claiming it had created a space for anti-vaxxers and conspiracy theories to take root. april 2021 on 7 april, the ministry of health reported that the total number of vaccinations reached 90,286, of which 19,273 were second doses. on 12 april, ardern confirmed that 86% of frontline workers have received at least one covid vaccination; accounting for 3,472 out of 4,010 workers. on 14 april, the total number of vaccinations reached 135,585, of which 30,194 were second doses. on 15 april, covid-19 response minister hipkins confirmed that members of the public who were not on the priority list for covid-19 vaccinations had been receiving jabs in order to prevent supplies from being wasted. hipkins' response followed last-minute appeals by the government to medical staff to get vaccinations before doses expire and anecdotal reports that "walk-ins" were being accepted at some clinics for the same reason. on 21 april, the total number of vaccinations reached 183,351, of which 42,771 were second doses. on 28 april, the total number of vaccinations reached 232,588, of which 60,024 were second doses. may 2021 on 5 may, the total number of vaccinations reached 217,603, of which 87,297 are second doses. this exceeded the government's overall targets by 3%. on 10 may, stuff reported that general practice clinics in auckland had begun vaccinating the general public, with waiheke medical centre in oneroa being recorded as the first such general practice to begin vaccinating patients. on 12 may, the total number of vaccinations reached 388,877, of which 120,090 were second doses. on 19 may, the total number of vaccinations reached 474,435, of which 152,933 are second doses. june 2021 on 9 june 2021, covid-19 response minister chris hipkins announced that new zealand would receive 1 million doses of the pfizer–biontech vaccine in july, bringing the total number to more than 1.9 million. on 21 june, medsafe has granted provisional approval for the pfizer/biontech covid-19 vaccine to be given to 12 to 15-year-olds. july 2021 on 7 july, medsafe granted provisional approval for the single-dose janssen covid-19 vaccine to be used for persons aged 18 years and above. on 19 july, the otago daily times reported that the university of otago's school of pharmacy was unable to fulfil a ministry of health request to train vaccinators since the otago course required an independent coordinator to accredit it. the health ministry's immunisation manager kath blair confirmed that the auckland-based immunisation advisory centre was the sole vaccinator training course provider in the country. that same day, covid-19 response minister chris hipkins confirmed that a shipment of more than 370,000 pfizer vaccines had arrived in new zealand, allowing the rollout to begin ramping up after slowing down over the past month. by 20 july, the southern district health board had reported administering 100,000 doses across otago and southland, focusing on people aged 65 years and above and those with underlying health conditions and disabilities. on 19 july 2021, the royal new zealand navy warship hmnzs wellington delivered 120 vials of the pfizer–biontech covid-19 vaccine to tokelau's nukunonu atoll, which is sufficient to vaccinate 720 people. new zealand's first covid-19 mass vaccination event held at manukau institute of technology and vodafone events centre in south auckland on 30 july 2021 on 30 july 2021, the first mass vaccination event in new zealand began in south auckland at manukau institute of technology and vodafone events centre with the goal of vaccinating at least 15,500 people over three days with the pfizer/biontech vaccine in one of the highest risk areas in the country. invitations were first sent to 12,500 students and staff at the institute, who were told they could book family members as well. however, after only around 3,000 booked to be vaccinated, auckland's district health boards ended up sending 140,000 invitations to reach their target bookings. the event featured a dozen vaccinators trying to average one vaccination every 90 seconds to handle the volume of people. august 2021 by 4 august, the total number of vaccinations in new zealand had reached 2,021,024, of which 769,708 were second doses. that same day, the ministry of health redesigned the vaccination card. the vaccination card was simplified (removing the 'batch number' and 'time given' fields), making it faster for vaccinators to fill out. this will help make the vaccination process more efficient, particularly for high-volume settings like mass vaccination events. the card has a notch cut out so it can be easily identified, and the font size and colour contrast have been increased. these changes improve the accessibility of the card for the blind and low vision community. on 12 august, ardern announced that the government would speed up the vaccine rollout by allowing people of all eligible ages to book by 1 september 2021. by 12 august, 15.4% of the population had received one dose, 21.6% had been fully vaccinated, and 63% remained unvaccinated. also on 12 august, director-general of health dr ashley bloomfield said the standard time will become 6 weeks between the first and second doses of the vaccine. in a statement, dr bloomfield said "moving to a longer gap allows us to give a first dose to a larger number of people faster, which means providing more people with partial protection sooner. this is an important part of our being prepared for a possible outbreak of the more infectious delta variant of the virus." on 15 august, the government acknowledged that 828 (roughly 32%) of the country's 2,611 port workers had not been vaccinated. within the bay of plenty district health board, 235 port workers had been fully vaccinated while 33 had received one dose and 249 had not been vaccinated. on 17 august, ardern announced that vaccinations would be suspended for a period of 48 hours in response to the nationwide alert level 4 lockdown. on 19 august, ardern announced cabinet has approved the vaccine for use in 12 to 15-year-olds. if parents are already booked, they can take their eligible children with them to be vaccinated. due to a misunderstanding among staff, families were turned away by staff from a rotorua vaccination site on 20 august. the lakes district health board subsequently apologised for the misunderstanding. that same day, the southern district health board (sdhb) confirmed that mass covid-19 vaccination clinics would be opened in dunedin and invercargill. the sdhb also confirmed that it was in talks with a 100 local providers in the southland and otago regions to provide vaccination services. the winton pharmacy became the first rural pharmacy to offer vaccinations in southland. on 20 august, the ministry of health expanded the vaccination priority group 2 to include "frontline staff who interact with customers and transport and logistic services directly supporting the vaccination programme" which includes alert level 4 services such as supermarkets, pharmacies, and petrol stations. on 21 august, ardern announced that there had been a record number of vaccine bookings, with over 150,000 bookings on 20 august. that same day, 56,843 were vaccinated. there were also 1,700 vaccination sites including general practitioners and pharmacists. on 22 august, chris hipkins announced that over 1,000,000 new zealanders had been fully vaccinated. 2.75 million doses have been administered so far and there are 1.5 million active bookings on the book my vaccine system. on 24 august, deputy prime minister grant robertson announced that on 23 august new zealand administered its most vaccines yet, over 63,000. that peak was exceeded the following day, with 80,000 vaccination doses delivered. on 26 august, a papamoa mother reported that she was unable to vaccinate her two children, who were aged between 12 and 15 years, despite a government announcement that said 12-15 year old's qualified for vaccination without needing to book. bay of plenty district health board incident controller trevor richardson later acknowledged that several vaccination centers were struggling to cope with record demand for vaccination services. on 27 august, the māori iwi ngāi tahu's health provider te kaika announced that it would open a new mass vaccination centre at the forsyth barr stadium in dunedin in coordination with the te roopu maori and the university of otago pacific island students' association. their aim is to vaccinate 6,000 students over a period of two days. that same day, the pacific trust otago opened a vaccination centre aimed at the pasifika community in dunedin's caversham suburb. on 29 august, the bay of plenty district health board drew media attention after pasifika families in tauranga were asked to bring passports to check if they were seasonal workers. local health provider sameli tongatea likened the ordeal to the dawn raids of the 1970s which disproportionately targeted pasifika overstayers. the bay of plenty dhb subsequently apologised for the hurt this had caused. the government also clarified that both residents and non-residents were eligible for vaccination. that same day, 49,500 people had been vaccinated nationwide; setting a new national record. as of 29 august, 3.33 million doses had been administered; with 2.17 million receiving their first dose and 1.16 million receiving their second dose. over 50 percent of the eligible population has received their first dose. september 2021 since 1 september 2021, anyone in new zealand aged 12 and over (regardless of their immigration status) is eligible to be vaccinated. in addition, the government confirmed that the gap between the first and second vaccines will be increased to six weeks. on 16 september, the government rolled out a vaccination bus programme known as "shot bro" to help bring vaccines to communities with lower vaccination rates or difficulty accessing vaccination services. the first three buses have been loaned to the northern regional health coordination centre. the shot bro programme is modelled after the australian mobile "jabba the bus" vaccination bus programme and seeks to boost vaccination rates within the māori and pasifika communities, which have lower vacciantion rates. the "shot bro" programme also supplements te hau ora ō ngāpuhi's mobile vaccination programme in the northland town of kaikohe. in response to low vaccination rates among the pasifika community, samoan community leaders in auckland including baderdrive doctors senior general practitioner dr sirovai fuata'i have launched drive-through vaccination events targeting south auckland suburbs with significant samoan populations including māngere, favona, papatoetoe, ōtara and manurewa. october 2021 sign advertising "walk-in" vaccination clinic in christchurch, in october 2021 in response to the waikato lockdown implemented on 3 october 2021, prime minister ardern stated that lockdowns would continue unless vaccination rates increased nationally. on 7 october, over 7,000 pasifika were