Jacinda Ardern vows to stop putting New Zealand in lockdown once vaccinations complete
As New Zealand records 68 new cases, Jacinda Ardern signals a shift away from the country’s Covid-19 elimination strategy.
New Zealand will stop using lockdowns to stamp out Covid-19 once vaccinations reach a high level, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said, signalling an eventual watering down of the government’s aim of eliminating the virus.
The comments from Ms Ardern on Thursday as the nation recorded 68 new cases are a shift in tone and follow similar remarks last weekend from the government’s Covid-19 response minister, who said the fast-spreading Delta variant poses big questions for New Zealand’s fortress strategy.
Ms Ardern said stamping out Covid-19 remains the best approach for New Zealand “for now,” but the goal is to get past using lockdowns and a border closure as the primary defences.
“Our collective goal is to move away from having to use these measures in that way and vaccines help us do that. No one wants to use lockdowns forever and I can tell you now that is not our intention,” she said. “But, for now, while we vaccinate, elimination is the goal.”
The country recorded another daily high of 68 Covid-19 infections on Thursday, amid fears the Delta variant has spread to Christchurch.
Ms Ardern warned that case numbers and lockdowns could potentially “be longer and bigger” because of a “time lag”.
“Lockdown is having an impact … but Delta is very, very tricky,” she said.
Director of public health Caroline McElnay said there are currently six sub-clusters associated with the outbreak, with viral fragments now detected in wastewater in Christchurch.
New Zealand’s nationwide lockdown is set to be reviewed on Friday, while Auckland, where the outbreak is concentrated, will remain under strict stay-at-home orders until at least August 31.
New Zealand has been in a strict lockdown since August 18 as it grapples with its first Covid-19 outbreak since February. The outbreak – 277 cases so far and mainly in Auckland – is small by global standards, but it has caused alarm locally since it marks the arrival in New Zealand of the more contagious Delta variant.
The New Zealand government’s aim of completely stopping the spread of the virus has been increasingly criticised abroad as untenable, given Covid-19 has become entrenched in most countries. But it still commands strong support within New Zealand despite the economic costs and the erosion of civil liberties during lockdowns.
Ms Ardern didn’t specify what proportion of the population would need to be vaccinated but said it would need to be the highest number possible. Among developed nations, New Zealand has been slow to vaccinate, with about 21 per cent of the population fully vaccinated.
With Dow Jones
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