Coronavirus: Omicron explosion in New Zealand renders curbs, isolation requirements obsolete
- New case numbers have exploded from less than 1,000 a day to more than 22,000, but total death toll remains low at just 65
- Elsewhere, job vacancies surge in Australia while South Korea’s early voting for this week’s election is marred by long waits for Covid sufferers
Two years after the pandemic began, New Zealanders are finally facing its reality.
“Psychologically it’s quite a big shock because to date the pandemic has been largely something that’s happened to other people,” said Michael Baker, Professor of Public Health at the University of Otago. “Until recently, the only people I knew who got infected with the virus lived overseas.”
New Zealand is one of the pandemic success stories. When Covid-19 first arrived, the government slammed the border shut, imposed one of the toughest lockdowns in the world and eradicated the virus from the community, allowing a quick return to normal. So far, the death toll is just 65.
But the emergence of more infectious strains in the second half of last year – first Delta then Omicron – proved too much for Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern’s elimination strategy.
Tight border controls, dubbed “Fortress New Zealand”, then became a mechanism to slow the spread of the virus, rather than to keep it out, while the government rushed to get people vaccinated.