Covid-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins says the current Delta outbreak means New Zealand might not forge ahead with the plan, unveiled less than a month ago, for reopening to the world in the first three months of 2022.
The Government, less than a week before Delta was detected in the community, said once everyone has had an opportunity to be vaccinated, travellers into New Zealand will be classified as either low, medium or high-risk depending on their vaccination status and where they come from.
Low-risk travellers won’t need to isolate on arrival, medium-risk travellers will need to meet modified isolation rules, including a shorter stay in managed isolation and/or self-isolation, and high-risk travellers will need to stay in managed isolation for two weeks.
However, Hipkins on Tuesday told Parliament Delta had “changed some of the thinking” and the Government would need to relook at things, “particularly the country-risk profiling”.
He didn't point to a new plan, but said self-isolation is still "part of the question".
“Obviously, at the moment, the focus is on responding to the current outbreak,” he said.
The Government’s plan for reopening, which it outlined at a high-profile event last month, was created at a time Delta was already wreaking havoc in other parts of the world.
In fact, the advice on which the plan was based, warned: “Even with current settings, New Zealand is liable to experience an outbreak similar to that in New South Wales over the coming months.”
Update on pilot for reopening due 'in coming weeks'
The Government a month ago also said the medium-risk pathway would be tested on a group of handpicked people who need to travel for work purposes.
It said this pilot would run between October and December. Businesses/organisations would need to prove travelling staff could isolate away from their families/flatmates on return.
However, the Government is yet to start receiving expressions of interest or applications from businesses/organisations interested in partaking in the pilot.
A spokesperson for the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet said: "While the intention remains that we run a trial later this year, this will ultimately depend on the Alert Levels in place.
"We expect to have an update on this work in the coming weeks."
Hipkins said the trial will still go ahead in the final three months of 2021.
However he said a “little bit of movement” may be required “because of the current outbreak that we’re dealing with”.
“So I wouldn’t put a specific timeframe on that at this point,” he said.
Asked how having Delta in the community impedes a select group of people travelling and self-isolating on their return to test a new system for the future, Hipkins said the government officials involved in the trial are tied up responding to the current outbreak.
BusinessNZ chief executive Kirk Hope told interest.co.nz the pilot's criterion hadn’t yet been fully developed. Earlier this week he provided the Government with suggestions for what this could look like.
The reason the Government decided to trial the pilot on employees is that they would be accountable to their employers, who will be cognisant of them complying to avoid brand/reputational damage.
Trans-Tasman bubble on ice
As for the trans-Tasman bubble, Hipkins said: "I think it would be unrealistic to expect that there will be speedy decisions in the next few weeks.”
He said Kiwis looking to return to New Zealand from Australia should try to book a spot in managed isolation or get in touch with consular officials if they need to return home for an emergency.
Indeed, Hipkins recently said New Zealanders in other parts of the world should avoid putting pressure on the managed isolation system if they simply want to return for a holiday.
August 12 plan for reopening
Below is a copy of a summary of what the Government's August 12 reopening plan looked like:
78 Comments
Global perspective helps
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-51235105
European countries have setup systems for inter country travel such as pre-flight testing, vaccination certification online verification, masks on flights, post-flight testing or checking, and venue limitations. And life goes on with movement between the UK, Germany, etc. And coded colours designating country risk levels.
Undoubtedly the minister is correct in stating the present application is prioritising control of the present outbreak. In fact he said it repeatedly despite the fact that in the words of his previous employer “that that is stating the bleeding obvious.” Not here but somewhere else reporting the same issue the minister referred to the plans in place supposedly for opening up but pre delta, as being bold. Hardly think so. Fumbling, speculative and uncertain by my count. But leaving that aside here at least is an announcement, but hells bells surely there has been enough going on around the globe by now for this government to come up with something a bit more substantial than suck it and see.
Agree Foxy, plus I think SloMo (sorry ScoMO) in Aussie bullied our Government into opening our borders before they were really ready. Ours may have been uncertain and cautious, but this out break and subsequent lockdown has proven that caution to be correct. It seems this time they might be stiffening a little, but Aussie has a long history of bullying us, and getting away with it.
Oh I well remember the day. An elbow jolt I would call it. Our PM lost her PR poise in a flash. Actually it was rather unfair because Australia had been more go stop go about the bubble. NZ government knew that Delta (not yet named) was up to 150,000 case a day in India at the time, they knew our border would become only as good as that of Australia, they knew our MIQ was suspect and most importantly they knew that vaccination levels in NZ were woefully inadequate but while they had painted themselves into a corner the media etc had played a part in that on the need for the bubble. Mainly that is, to refuse the bubble would have had a hugely negative impact on the popularity polls.Yes an elbow jolt can be very effective, especially if undeserved. Got one myself like that from a rather famous full back here who went on to infamously pull the same trick in SA. Ten years later I lost the tooth for good.
In the 12 months to June 30 2020 there were 33990 deaths in NZ .... an average of 93 per day .... Covid-19 or not , some just stop living ...
.... there was 250 fewer deaths , 33740 ... in the previous year .... so , forget those bleeding heart funeral directors who weep that their business is dying ..
What's even stranger is that even in many European countries with declining populations (even structural, long term declines) house prices are rising over the rate of inflation. That, to me, seems forewarning of the effect of low interest rates over a prolonged period are engineering.
Presumably that's house prices in places that people want to live, eg nice cities. House prices in little villages and the countryside are likely declining, especially if they need a lot of maintenance.
I've seen houses for sale for 1 euro in some places for example, but you have to sign a contract that you'll renovate and maintain the place.
Estonia? I mean I wouldn't say it's a terrible place to live but the Baltic sea would definitely come a firm second to the Côte d'Azur for most people.
Typically those €1 come with a bond (e.g. €30-50k) that needs to be paid and a promise to fully renovate the houses within some time period.
Did you see where the German Government confiscated 80,000 properties from one land lord and is planing to sell them. The land lord will be compensated at the price they paid for the properties.
That is the sort of thing that we need to see more of. I hope that this becomes a strong trend. Things cannot carry on as they are.
It was on Radio NZ yesterday. I can't find a link to that exactly, but it has been going on there for a few years now.
https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/10352/germany-migrants-property-righ…
Remember there are a lot of apartments and he will only get paid his purchase price. Not hyper inflated current prices.
filtering on Realestate for residential sections at 50k or less = 22 properties. Of which 8 have a listed price, the rest are negotiation,deadline sale or auction (so expect to go for more).
Of those 8, 1 is a house for removal, 1 is a carpark only, 1 is a managed apt in a resort. The rest are vacant sections.
Some further digging, and a couple of studio apts for under 100k (i.e. 50k GBP)
With this being the cheapest house and land https://www.realestate.co.nz/4068157/residential/sale/112-birchwood-roa… and what a stunner it is.
To put that into context however about 83 people per day die of flu in the UK in a normal year. Also the data is skewed by the death of people who are unvaccinated.
We need to be clear that hospitalisations and deaths will rise even in a fully vaccinated population because vaccines only offer limited protection. Whether we reopen in Q1, 2021 or Q1, 2031 the net impact will be the same, you cannot fully escape the effects of the pandemic.
Exactly. The way forward will never be zero risk.
It was obvious from the start that we would need to open up at some point, and some people will die because of that decision
We need to be ruthless in our preparation. And then we need to boldly move forward.
Yes people will die. No, that is not an excuse to do nothing.
If the thinking is that borders will be shut even with once case than 2022 is ruled out.
Instead of taking extreme measures should go with a plan / system as should realize that many citizens in New Zealand are immigrants with families overseas.
USA, Europe and other countries are allowing, once 70% or 80% of population is vaccinated.
What the government really wants is a perfect vaccine but, in reality, no such thing exists and no pharmaceutical company has ever promised or suggested such a thing is feasible. Having been on a divergent strategy with the world for 18 months New Zealand now needs to converge again.
Absolutely ridiculous idea that would achieve nothing long-term. The Delta variant won't go anywhere whether we reopen in Q1 or stall reopening the border until later.
The world is returning to normal and so must we once everyone who wants a vaccine has had the opportunity to have one. We have languished long enough, we must move forwards and progress.
Well, I don't know what you definition is, but global death rates are falling again and most OECD countries are removing restrictions put in place to curb the rate of infection. I'd describe that as a return to normality. If you are waiting for a formal end to be declared you may be waiting a very long time.
The US death rate is ramping to almost exceed their worst pre-vaccine numbers.
A lot of the world has given up to the detriment of their citizens health and lives, and the economic day of reckoning will come.
That's not a return to normal, that's a new normal and one we might want to take pause to see if we want to adopt it.
The real question is, what's going to happen when we get out of this lockdown and then have another outbreak? At what point does public opinion turn against all these lockdowns? Feels like we're getting close to that point.
Maybe they're keen on continuing the lockdown approach until Novavax has been rolled out? That feels like a long way off though.
We cannot reopen because hospitals are stressed out already. And even with a 95% vaccination rate we still will have lots of people going to hospital and die. This government is failing us at so many points. Lucky our economy is doing so much better than we expected. Yeah right.
You are absolutely right. The hospitals are collapsing and the situation has gone over the edge. Nurses are leaving in their droves. The worse it gets the faster it is going to get worse. This is also happening all over the world. In the USA they are offering up to USA$150 per hour and a $40,000 lump sum to just attract nurses. (if you think that is attractive, you don't know what it is like to work in hell) The face book chatter is that some nurses will take this on with the intention of using the money to retrain out of nursing. That is how desperately horrible the profession has become. Don't take my word for it, ask a few nurses if they would ever chose the profession if they had their chance again. If you know anybody considering taking on nursing and you have any feelings for them, do everything that you can to talk them out of it. In NZ, the Govt and DHBs tread you like absolute dirt and pay peanuts and have no intention of doing otherwise. A newly graduated nurse with a 3 year degree and student loan would be better off picking vegetables for Leader brands who if I heard the interview correctly, are working toward paying something like $27 per hour plus transport, lunch and a $2 per hour bonus for just turning up each morning.
It looks like their plan to attract nurses from other parts of the country to Auckland has stalled at about 120-130. I don't they will get many more. After all there are shortages everywhere.
... prioritise vaccinated people for hospital beds , if they need them for Covid recovery or anything else ...
If you're unvaccinated , and writhing in pain cos the ivermectin you took is toxic : too bad .... if you think you're smarter than the experts and chose not to be jabbed , be smart enough to heal yourself out of this one ... dumbarse ...
Avoidable deaths aplenty pre CV19 and pop and gov did not feel need to stop them. Now PM hand wringing about any CV19 deaths it seems. And all other non CV19 deaths? Meanwhile lovely Ashley feels he cannot question ED triage procedures
Well as kindness now compulsory our critical and accountable functions are not required
zzzz
I strongly think the biggest bottleneck to us relaxing restrictions is the hospital system. This is the hardest thing to fix and should be the main government focus.
It doesn't matter how inefficient it is, how much it costs, we should be building dedicated areas for covid patients and getting health staff from any place we can to look after them.
Once that's in place then the secondary priority should be getting rapid testing to more quickly identify cases.
This coupled with vaccines and we should be able to open. Maybe with some controls in place to reduce the r number such as compulsory masking and no large events.
Id be happy if they cancelled every roading project for the next three years and made masks compulsory as long as it meant a controlled opening or the boarders with a well resourced medical system.
I honestly have no idea what the ministry of health and our dhbs have been doing over the last year.
Well now how about that then. A light bulb moment surely. If covid threatens hospital services and if covid cannot be denied entry would it not then be logical to at the least begin planning to improve hospital services to meet the inevitable threat. A bit late in the day but somebody turn the light on for our government please.
the natives (is the NZ public) are getting restless and the government knows it.
This time last year everybody thought lockdown was the solution -it beat been like the UK, Italy and the US with thousands dying, and the public lapped up the government saying that they care for us so much.
12 months later - reality is setting in and with the rest of the world starting to return to normality, lockdowns look almost arcahic and dictatorial - especially when you squeeze the lifeblood out of the economy. A lot of people are finding it harder now to afford mortgages ( especially when they are 30% on higher) on the wage subsidy.
The real lesson though - is the government didnt care about kiwis - they didnt want to be found wanting on the medical and hospital system - which from years of underinvestment has been rotting from the inside out.
12 months ago - we didnt have enough ventilators- so what did the government do- NOTHING
12 months ago we didnt have enough ICU beds - so what did the government do - NOTHING.
12 months ago we didnt have enough nurses and medical staff - so what did the government do- they paid them NOTHING more in the last 12 months - so they all left.
12 months ago we had the option of been first in line for vaccines - what did the government do- they gave them to poorer countries and did NOTHING to protect their citizens.
In 12 months the government did nothing more to fix the medical system. So now the strategy is to keep borders shut- because there is no way the government wants kiwis to know that they have done NOTHING - and the consequences of doing NOTHING will be people will die.
The sad thing is even when the pandemic becomes a memory- the NZ medical system will still not have enough ventilators, or enough ICU beds or enough medical staff. I hope you dont get cancer, have a stroke or heart attack or a major accident- because quite simply the health system is broken.
After 18 months our health response appears to be the lead the world.
Save us from the pandemic!
Make houses cheaper!
Protect us from terror attacks!
Make more hospitals!
Buy more gear!
Your expectations of what a government can achieve in a time of an international health crisis might be a bit unreasonable.
I think you will find the only thing Nz leads the world in is house price inflation. Locking borders and the population down so they don’t need to use a broken health system isn’t world leading it’s avoiding a problem that should be fixed.
as for the rest of your comment - actually I expect all of those issues to be addressed - it’s why we have governments to fix the problems and ensure we have adequate services that we pay taxes for. Labour have delivered almost nothing in 4 years - which is sad for them but sadder for us who can now only say - hey we lead the world - in house price inflation
ow
Almost every country has experienced house price inflation over the last 18 months.
Ours is the highest. Weve had one of the lowest covid death rates also.
Maybe there's a connection there.
Maybe you're into something, if we left covid ravage the population and health system prices will stabilise.
Sure, if you ignore the years before that in which the government was also doing nothing about any of its key promises. There was no pandemic in 2017-2018-2019, but it didn't stop them cynically dropping policy or using announcements about announcements to head off anyone who suggested they maybe weren't doing what they said they would to get elected.
I think you are right. Its unlikely to be 2022 imo. They really need to have the trial well underway by summer so we can test how it goes and deal with any potential disasters in a warm climate.
Come mid March-Ish it’s too late. If we are in the midst of an outbreak and have freedom of movement, it’d be really hard to get that under control by the time the cold weather sets in. We could wind up having an exit wave in winter which they’ll want to avoid.
I reckon we are looking at end of 2022. Sorry that you won’t get to see your family, that’s rough
I think looking overseas we are going to have to accept a need to redesign our expectations around normal. USA is having huge problems with schools with delta outbreaks maybe education will need to be delivered more online and smaller classes gathering intermittently for specialist subjects . Hospitality will not look the same large venues will become uneconomic again small gatherings in a safe environment. Normal as we have known it will not reoccur unless there is a medical breakthrough.
To be honest some of the 'moving classes online' stuff should have happened years ago, but universities in NZ haven't felt the need so haven't bothered. If you want to retrain in an undergrad degree, in many cases you have to find the time to be on campus during business hours. Not exactly practical if one is already working, nor really acceptable in 2021. It's not like the internet has popped up overnight, and lectures have been recorded since the mid 2000s at most tertiary institutions.
I did a post graduate diploma with Massey 15 years ago that was all online with 1-2 contact courses (2 day blocks in Palmerston North) a semester.
It was a good balance to get to know your classmates a little bit better while facilitating distance learning.
It definitely is not that hard.
I wish media would cease fear monge
ring using words like “wreak havoc”
Facts: even in uk and USA CV19 only infected 10% pop. Of those infected, 98-89% did not die
Question our supine media never ask is why virus does not infect other 90%??
also might ask what is level of active cases per country? In uk at present active cases are 35% lower than in Feb and deaths are 95% lower
Keymetric not given or asked for is what % of tests per day are positive? It is minuscule
Once vaccination at 80% in a country those infected 90% less likely to be hospitalised or die meaning what is left is seasonal flu
Media want free feeding fear driven agenda to last forever but pop getting sick to back teeth of whole thing
A large number of people have died - often without loved ones by their sides - due to Covid-19. People have fallen very ill and face the uncertainty of potential long-term effects. Lockdowns have tested relationships, isolated people and seen them forgo basic human liberties to keep themselves and others safe. People have missed important life events - births, weddings, spending time with sick relatives, funerals etc. Some have lost their jobs or had their incomes reduced. International travel has largely stopped. Supply chains have been disrupted. Governments and central banks have provided enormous amounts of stimulus - at a cost. We're going to pull through. But if this virus hasn't "wreaked havoc" then I don't know what has.
Jenée, you could just as equally say:
"A large number of people have died - often without loved ones by their sides - due to LOCKDOWNS" (bear in mind the vast, vast majority of people die from other causes than Covid)
Also I'd like to suggest an answer to your question "if the virus hasn't wreaked havoc, then I don't know what has" LOCKDOWN has wreaked havoc
Enjoy being prisoners in NZ for another 3-5 years. Borders ain't opening and those who are not lucky enough to be NZ Citizens or Permanent Residents will find it nearly impossible to see their families for a long time (unless of course they sacrifice their visas and also residency which they worked hard to get).
Be Kind and Be Quick!
NZ needs to wake up.
1) Where I currently reside the effective double vaccination rate is about 87% (2x vaccinated or had covid). The daily cases are still circa 500 per day (NZ equivalent) with 1 death per day (NZ equivalent ) but also a younger population profile which means the NZ fatality rate will be higher at a similar vaccination rate.
2) NZ is going to face similar circumstances when the borders are opened. There will be too much pressure to re-open once the vaccination rate is 80%+ to keep the borders closed.
2) NZ is going to need more ICUs. This is a pandemic. There should be no resource spared to get the doctors and nurses and beds in place now by paying whatever is necessary to get the staff from overseas. I dont understand why NZ hasnt already gone down this path in the last 18 months. (The government has just gifted itself 41bn - spend it on something useful). We can get the permanent ICUs above OECD average and then over time let them come back to the average.
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