New tactics may be necessary in battle

WELLINGTON: Empty corridors in one hotel, vaccine stockpiles and mutant variants loom large in new debates about how to defeat Covid19.

University of Otago epidemiologist Prof Michael Baker said alert levels “desperately” needed revision due to new mutations and the fact New Zealand’s fourtier system was almost a year old.

New Covid19 varieties, including some believed to be more infectious than earlier strains, have emerged independently in Brazil, South Africa and the United Kingdom.

Prof Baker said New Zealand’s alert level system worked well when introduced but now needed revision, and an integrated national facemask policy could be considered.

He said a new alert system could have more than four tiers.

It was crucial, he said, that security measures for people leaving managed isolation and quarantine were enforceable but not draconian.

Current regional rule variations, such as Auckland’s public transport facemask mandate, could be confusing.

Auckland’s Pullman Hotel was emptying out, as the Government worked to decommission it temporarily and determine how a guest was infected with a mutant strain.

A man contacted The New Zealand Herald to say a relative was about to leave the Pullman worried she was putting herself and others at risk by flying to Wellington to selfisolate.

Rules for the Pullman changed after a guest with a new South African strain left the hotel and visited more than two dozen Northland locations, not knowing she had the virus.

Since Thursday, Pullman guests leaving managed isolation have been asked to get a day5 postdeparture test and stay home until returning a negative result for Covid19.

Microbiologist Associate Prof Siouxsie Wiles said Pullman guests flying to other cities for selfisolation were not posing a greater risk if maskwearing on flights was adhered to.

The Ministry of Health has said guests leaving the hotel for their five days of selfisolation could wear a mask while using public transport to get home.

Prof Wiles said airlines should not serve food and drink on domestic flights, as doing so undermined efforts to encourage maskwearing.

While the Pullman would soon be devoid of guests, other hotels in the system were full.

Not one vacancy before May 31 was listed on the official MIQ website yesterday.

The rollout of vaccines has given hope to some wealthy countries in recent weeks.

However, the World Heath Organisation has voiced concern about wealthy countries securing vaccine stocks while some poorer nations struggle to vaccines.

“It’s not acceptable that the ‘Global South’ is going to have to wait another year or two,” Prof Wiles said yesterday.

Apart from possible ethical issues, it was impractical for wealthy countries to allow poorer ones to fall behind in vaccinations.

She said countries such as New Zealand, Australia and Taiwan — which achieved elimination — could be at risk if huge outbreaks involving new strains emerged elsewhere.

Last week, an International Chamber of Commerce study found “vaccine nationalism” could cost the global economy up to $12.8 trillion.

That cost, many times higher than the price of supplying poor countries with vaccines, derived from projected shocks to global trade and economic production.

“The more open an economy is, the stronger the economic incentive it should have in ensuring trading partners have access to vaccines,” the study said.

Prof Wiles said hoarding was not necessarily a funding or foreign aid issue, but related to vaccine supply.

She said India and South Africa had asked the World Trade Organisation to temporarily suspend intellectual property rights so poorer countries could access Covid vaccines.

Some wealthy countries said IP systems were needed to encourage inventions of vaccines and treatments.

Dr Wiles said procedures effective at keeping earlier Covid strains out might not be resilient enough for more transmissible new varieties.

No new Covid19 cases were reported yesterday and New Zealand had 69 active cases.

More than 97% of people who had left managed isolation at the Pullman between January 9 and 24 had tested negative.

The Ministry of Health was waiting for results from five other guests. — The New Zealand Herald