Slow and steady

For the past few months, my daily ritual has been to wake up and drink a cup of coffee while catching up on the latest global Covid-19 case numbers and deaths. It’s a sobering way to start the day. In six months, the world has gone from 27 cases of an unidentified pneumonia in China to more than 10 million confirmed cases and half a million deaths across nearly every country and territory. Eighty-six of those are reporting community transmission. The Unites States is leading the world, alternating with Brazil for the top spot for number of daily cases.

The rising number of daily cases has led Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General of the World Health Organisation, to warn that the world is in a ‘‘new and dangerous phase’’. Yet in New Zealand we are at alert level 1. We’re one of a small number of countries with no community transmission. We’ve eliminated the virus.

Yes, we are still seeing cases in people returning from overseas. But the strategy of putting arrivals into managed isolation for 14 days is working. It means we get to work, shop, and socialise without worrying we might spread or catch Covid-19.

There are loud voices saying it’s unworkable for New Zealand to stay closed off from the rest of the world. They want to know when we will let the tourists come back. Lots of people have been asking me why we can’t test them before they get on the plane. If they test negative then surely that means they can have their holiday without the 14 days in managed isolation? No, it doesn’t.

The best test we have looks for the genetic material of the virus. It tells us whether the person has detectable amounts of the virus on the day they were tested. People can test negative but still be incubating Covid-19, a phase that can last from about two to 10 days.

Iceland has eased travel restrictions and is now open to passengers from the 26 European countries inside the Schengen Area. Arriving passengers can choose to be tested for Covid-19 or go into quarantine for two weeks.

If they test negative, they can have their holiday. If they test positive, they go into quarantine. Children 15 and under are exempt from testing and quarantine.

We should watch carefully how this works out over the next weeks and months. We only need to look at Melbourne to see what happens when you allow community transmission to take off again.

We’d be wise to learn from others’ mistakes before jeopardising all the hard work our team of five million put in to get us to where we are today.

We’d be wise to learn from others’ mistakes before jeopardising all our hard work.