Border tightens as cases spike
Travel to New Zealand from newlydesignated ‘‘very high-risk’’ countries will be restricted to New Zealand citizens, in a bid to make the country’s border defences safer.
Yesterday, Covid-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins announced the Government has created a new ‘‘very high-risk’’ country category, that will ‘‘significantly’’ reduce the number of infected people flying to New Zealand.
At present, India, Brazil, Papua New Guinea and Pakistan are considered very high risk – where there have been more than 50 cases of Covid-19 per 1000 arrivals this year, and where there are more than 15 travellers on average per month.
As a result, travel from these counties will be temporarily restricted to New Zealand citizens, their partners and children, and parents of children who are New Zealand citizens.
For India alone – which is currently seeing more than 200,000 new cases per day – this is expected to reduce the number of potential positive cases coming to New Zealand by an estimated 75 per cent, Hipkins said.
The new category comes into force from 11.59pm on April 28, the same day the Government’s temporary ban on flights from India is set to end.
The temporary ban was introduced on April 8, amid a massive wave of cases in India, to curb the rising number of travellers testing positive on arrival.
Hipkins said the move would have a ‘‘significant impact’’ on a number of people.
‘‘I want to stress this was not an easy decision. It was based entirely on current risk assessment and will be reviewed regularly.’’
All travellers from very high risk countries will require evidence of a negative PCR test within 72 hours prior to travel.
There will be an exceptions process on humanitarian grounds, Hipkins announced.
The classification was in response to the rapidly increasing rates of infection in parts of the globe, the prevalence of variants of concern, the public health measures the country has in place, and the risk to New Zealand’s border, he said.
Despite high case numbers in the United States and United Kingdom, travellers from these countries were about 10 times less likely to have Covid-19 when they arrive than someone from India, and about six times less likely to be infected than those from Brazil, Papua New Guinea or Pakistan.
Officials will continue to develop the very high risk framework, and will provide an update in May on the process for adding new countries to the list, and for removing countries from it, Hipkins said.
Another step announced yesterday will see most managed isolation and quarantine facilities (MIQ) introduce an enhanced group intake system to further reduce risk of in-facility transmission.
Under the new plan, returnees arriving in New Zealand over a 96-hour window will be delivered to an MIQ facility until it is full, or the 96-hour period is over.
The facility will then ‘‘lock down’’ for a 14-day cycle, with no additional returnees allowed until after the last of the group has completed their stay, and the facilities have been cleaned.
Hipkins said this will ensure returnees will be in the same facility as others who arrived at about the same time, and will be keep apart from those those whose stay is coming to an end.
The Pullman Hotel will be the first MIQ to receive ‘‘cohorted’’ arrivals, starting from today.
The ‘‘emptying process’’ to transition to enhanced cohorting has already started. Five facilities are no longer receiving new returnees, to prepare them to receive a cohort of arrivals.
Hipkins said the number of available rooms will be temporarily reduced by bringing forward scheduled hotel maintenance to April-May, from July-September.
However, ‘‘thousands’’ of rooms will be freed up to the end of May by MIQ cancelling all remaining vouchers held by travellers from Australia, he said.