New Zealand is bracing for the arrival of Omicron, with the highly infectious Covid-19 variant expected to breach the nation’s closed border at any time. “We know that with Omicron it is a case of when, not if,” Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern told a news conference on Monday in Auckland. “We’re doing what we can, but I think it would be wrong for us to assume that those border measures will be sufficient. At some point, we will see Omicron in the community.” The government has delayed a phased reopening of the border to keep Omicron out while it rushes to administer booster vaccination shots and begin inoculating children. Thailand, Indonesia plan to develop Covid-19 pill While 93 per cent of adults are now fully vaccinated, the evidence from neighbouring Australia shows that Omicron will still lead to a surge in infections. That will be a new experience for New Zealand, which managed to eliminate coronavirus from the community in the initial stages of the pandemic. Even though it failed to repeat the feat when the Delta strain arrived in August last year, that outbreak has been kept in check by rising vaccination rates. The country has recorded just 52 deaths from Covid-19. Don’t browbeat parents into vaccinating their kids. Persuade them Ardern said the government was learning from other nations grappling with Omicron outbreaks as it prepared to manage its own. She urged eligible people to get a booster shot, saying it clearly provided greater protection against the variant. Omicron cases are being caught at the border, where arrivals are required to enter managed-isolation facilities. Over the weekend, a worker at one of the government-run sites tested positive for Omicron, though all their close contacts in the community have so far tested negative. “It is incredibly important that we prepare as much as we can,” Ardern said. “There’s no firm way to be able to establish how long our border measures are able to hold.” Singaporean infected with 2 variants in 8 months A man in Singapore was diagnosed with Covid-19 involving two different variants in a span of eight months, local media reported. The 37-year-old, who had completed his two-dose Covid-19 vaccine regime in November, was infected with the Delta Plus strain while he was abroad last May, contracted the Omicron variant of the coronavirus while travelling to the city state in December. “The Delta Plus infection left me with body aches and a fever that lasted three days, and it took me a while to get better,” he told The Straits Times . “With the Omicron variant, I had only a scratchy throat, but I was thankful my wife and child were still overseas as they too might have been infected again if they were with me.” He added the reinfection was mild and the symptoms subsided after four days. Unvaccinated workers in Singapore risk losing their jobs The man believed the milder nature of Omicron and being fully inoculated gave him more protection against severe disease in his second bout with the respiratory illness. Dr Choy Chiaw Yee, a consultant at the National Centre for Infectious Diseases, said that the risk of hospitalisation for those infected with Omicron is about one-third that of Delta, and Omicron seems to cause fewer deaths as well. “Although this may seem promising, it is important to note that the Omicron variant is noted to be more transmissible than the Delta variant, and also more likely to infect people who previously had Covid-19,” the report quoted her as saying. Japan to allow in some foreign students Japan plans to allow 87 government-sponsored foreign students into the country, making an exception to its entry ban on non-resident foreigners that is currently in place amid the pandemic, the top spokesman said on Monday. Entry of the students will be allowed possibly from later this month and they will be required to quarantine for 10 days after arrival at hotels prepared by their schools, government sources said. Tokyo decided on the exception “considering public interest and the urgency of the matter,” Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno told a press conference. The 87 students have less than one year left until they graduate or finish their studies and the government decided to allow them in so they can finish their schooling, Matsuno said. Japan introduced the entry ban on November 30 last year amid growing concerns over the Omicron variant. The measure was extended last week until the end of February. The government has said it will ease the entry restrictions if there are “special circumstances,” including visits to those who are seriously ill or for funerals, but it has stuck to its policy since the emergence of the Omicron variant. Matsuno said the government will consider individual cases in making further exceptions. The move comes as academic and economic circles have continued to voice concerns after a growing number of foreign students gave up on studying in Japan in the face of the country’s strict border controls. The government’s measures are “affecting foreign students and businesses that employ foreign workers,” ANA Holdings Inc. President Shinya Katanozaka said last week. Meanwhile, Japan’s government is deliberating placing stricter coronavirus measures, known as a “quasi” state of emergency, on Tokyo and surrounding prefectures within the week, broadcaster FNN reported. Thailand mulls resuming quarantine-free travel scheme Thailand is considering resumption of its programme that allows quarantine-free entry for vaccinated travellers from more than 60 countries, according to the Health Ministry. The rules were suspended in late December as the omicron strain spread. Deputy Premier and Health Minister Anutin Charnvirakul said that officials will propose the resumption of the plan on Thursday to the nation’s virus task force, which is led by Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha. Tourism-reliant Thailand suspended its quarantine-free visas less than a month ago to limit the spread of Covid-19 even though the programme helped attract about 350,000 travellers in just two months. PM says testing kit shortage ‘not unique’ to Australia Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison on Monday said the shortages of at-home antigen tests were “not unique” to the country as authorities deal with a runaway Omicron outbreak that has driven up hospitalisation rates and strain testing systems. Australia is facing a shortage of at-home rapid antigen test kits after asymptomatic close contacts were told to bypass government-funded testing hubs, where high volumes delayed results by several days, and take their own tests. “The rapid antigen tests are in short supply all around the world. This is not something that is unique to Australia going through it,” Morrison told radio station 2GB on Monday. “It’s part of dealing with Omicron. Omicron has disrupted everything.” The country’s competition regulator on Monday flagged “significant concerns” about reports of price gouging of testing kits amid reports of stockpiling and called inflated prices “clearly outrageous.” After successfully containing the virus earlier in the pandemic, Australia has reported nearly 1.3 million cases over the last two weeks, overwhelming hospitals and testing clinics. Daily infections on Monday dipped in New South Wales and Victoria, Australia’s most populous states, amid expectations the Omicron wave had neared its peak. But net new hospitalisation remains elevated, with more people admitted than at any other time in the pandemic. Nearly 74,000 cases were reported on Monday, the country’s lowest tally in a week. National daily numbers had touched a record 150,000 last Thursday but have been steadily falling since then. Separately, Australia’s Therapeutic Goods Administration has recognised Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine for the purpose of international travel to the country. So far, Australia has reported around 1.6 million infections and 2,699 deaths since the pandemic began. Unvaccinated banned from Manila public transit People who are not fully vaccinated against Covid-19 were banned from riding public transport in the Philippine capital region on Monday in a desperate move that has sparked protests from labour and human rights groups. The Philippines’ vaccination campaign has been dogged by public hesitancy and delays, while the Omicron variant has fuelled a recent spike in infections. From less than a thousand new cases daily during the Christmas holidays, the Department of Health counted a record of more than 39,000 on Saturday. Under the Department of Transportation’s “no vax, no ride” policy, commuters who are not fully vaccinated will not be allowed to ride public jeepneys, taxis, buses, sea ferries and commercial planes to and from and within Metropolitan Manila unless they show proof that they are on urgent errands or cannot be vaccinated for medical reasons. The restriction will last at least to the end of January and was an offshoot of President Rodrigo Duterte’s warning that unvaccinated Filipinos who defy orders to stay at home to ease community infections could face arrest . ‘May God guide us’: Filipinos fear Omicron will ‘paralyse’ nation “There are indeed legitimate reasons for aiming to vaccinate as many people as possible. However, these reasons should not prevent people from freedom of movement,” said Butch Olano of Amnesty International in the Philippines. Experts say the policy’s legality could be questioned before the Supreme Court. There were concerns how poor drivers of jeepneys, Manila’s popular public transport icon, could efficiently enforce the restriction and check vaccination certificates while driving with passengers constantly getting on and off at the back exit away from his view. Police warned commuters who show fake proofs of vaccination could be fined or jailed. The Department of Transportation said the policy aims to foster public health and prevent public commuter train systems from being shut down again like last year after many of their personnel got infected. To “those saying that the ‘no vaccination, no ride-entry’ policy in public transport is anti-poor, draconian or punitive, we believe that it is more anti-poor and anti-life if we will not impose interventions that will prevent loss of life due to non-vaccinations,” it said. More than 54 million of about 109 million Filipinos have been fully vaccinated in a government campaign that has initially been saddled with delays and public hesitancy. The Philippines has confirmed more than 3.1 million Covid-19 infections, with 52,858 deaths, among the worst in Southeast Asia. Indian firm working on Omicron-specific vaccine India ’s Gennova Biopharmaceuticals is working on an Omicron-specific Covid-19 vaccine candidate that could be ready in a month or two, a person with direct knowledge of the matter said. The source, who did not want to be named as the information was private, said the product might need a small trial in India before it could be rolled out as a booster or stand-alone vaccine. A representative for Gennova, a unit of drug maker Emcure Pharmaceuticals that does business in some 70 countries, did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Pfizer said last week a redesigned Covid-19 vaccine that specifically targets the Omicron variant could be ready to launch by March. The source said Gennova on Friday separately submitted to India’s drug regulator phase 2 trial data for its original mRNA vaccine candidate. The government said last year that product was found to be “safe, tolerable, and immunogenic” in the participants of an initial study. If given emergency-use approval, this would be the country’s first mRNA Covid-19 vaccine like the ones developed by Pfizer and Moderna. Reporting by Bloomberg, Reuters, SCMP’s Asia desk, Kyodo, Associated Press