New Zealanders nervous about move to Level One

Health officials have not yet considered moving the country to Auckland’s main street has gained a bit more life since level 3 restrictions were removed on Sunday (August 30, 2020) night, but a move to Level 1 is not yet in sight. 

Cabinet Ministers will meet on Friday (September 4, 2020) to review the alert level settings, which are set to expire on Sunday.

Auckland is at Alert Level 2.5, which means that there are tighter restrictions on mass gatherings.

The same rules do not apply for the rest of the country, which is at Alert Level 2.

Criteria for Alert Level 1

At a Health Select Committee meeting this morning, New Zealand First MP Jenny Marcroft asked what criteria were being considered to move the country down to Alert Level 1.

Health Minister Chris Hipkins said that there could still be cases in the community at the lowest two alert levels, as long as they were contained.

“The real test is different levels of containment at level two and At Level 1, rather than complete elimination before you would move to Alert Level 1. We (Cabinet) have not yet considered any advice on a shift from Level 2 to Level 1,” Mr Hipkins said.

Director General of Health Ashley Bloomfield said that officials were not yet considering moving Auckland and the rest of the country to Alert Level 1.

Instead, the focus was on moving Auckland from Alert Level 2.5 to 2.

“Level 2.5 in Auckland will not last forever. It is likely to change soon,” Mr Hipkins said.

Covid-19 Message blunder

Dr Bloomfield offered the Select Committee an explanation as to why hundreds of thousands of Aucklanders were advised to get an unnecessary Covid-19 test.

Everyone in West and South Auckland was wrongly advised at the weekend to get a test, regardless of whether they were showing symptoms.

The unclear advice made Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern “incredibly angry” and work was being done to correct it, she said on Sunday (August 30, 2020).

Dr Bloomfield said that when social media messaging was prepared, key words were missed out, which lead to a “completely different” message being made public.

Border testing schedule

A schedule for regular testing of border and managed isolation workers will be released by the end of the week, Hipkins told the Health Select Committee.

Dr Bloomfield said that workers at the highest risk will be tested weekly, lower risk workers will be tested fortnightly and those on the periphery could have monthly tests.

Mr Hipkins said that shipping ports were the most complex places to conduct testing, “because of the nature of what they do and the huge volume of people that interact with the port.”

Many workers had next to no potential exposure, he said, while others had quite a high level.

Tests at ports

Officials have been working with port companies to establish a testing regime.

“There are thousands of people there, many different employers trying to do the right thing, and (some have) quite irregular contact with the ports. So, if you are a driver coming to and from the port, for example, you are not always going to be there at the same time. So, we have  been working to identify what are the peaks for when testing capability needs to be there. Shift changes are a good example,” Mr Hipkins said.

Katie Scotcher is a Political Reporter at Radio New Zealand. The above Report and Picture have been published under a Special Arrangement with www.rnz.co.nz