FIRST FLIP-FLOP
Lockdowns are the Government’s primary tool for cracking down on Covid-19 clusters that are deemed to be spread beyond control. And, until Saturday, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern had never flip-flopped on a lockdown decision.
But a year after the first Covid19 case in New Zealand was discovered, Ardern for the first time ordered Auckland back into lockdown for the same cluster which Cabinet felt was under control after a three-day lockdown more than a week earlier.
Did something go wrong? A new community case of Covid-19 was discovered on Saturday, a 21-year-old man who could have been infectious in the community for a week.
Ardern said this case, labelled Case M, sparked sufficient concern. The young man was described as making a ‘‘big mistake’’ by Covid-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins; he had attended a gym while awaiting the results of a Covid-19 test.
But Case M was not the only community case found since Cabinet decided to lift the prior lockdown, 10 days earlier. That day, two more community cases of Covid-19 were confirmed and hundreds of possible contacts still needed to be tested.
As more Covid-19 cases cropped up in the week that followed, thousands of people were being asked to self-isolate as Auckland descended further down the alert levels, to level 1.
Until Saturday, Ardern, her ministers and Dr Ashley Bloomfield appeared confident the cluster was under control. Here’s how Auckland reached lockdown, again.
Wednesday, February 17 – Auckland’s lockdown lifts
Ardern had given a three-day deadline on a lockdown of Auckland after three Covid-19 cases were discovered on Valentine’s Day, February 14.
These cases labelled A, B and C were a family in south Auckland, one a worker at LSG SkyChefs near Auckland airport, and another a student at Papatoetoe High School (PHS).
After two days of no new community cases, two more cases labelled D and E were identified on Wednesday, February 17. The cases were from a second family, a classmate at PHS and a sibling of that classmate.
By Wednesday, with a decision on alert levels to come, some 128 close contacts of the first three cases had been identified, 76 had been tested and 49 were pending.
There were 1159 negative results from ‘‘casual-plus’’ contacts, and 363 test results were still outstanding. Casual-plus contacts are people who need to have a test on or after day five from their date of possible exposure, and must self-isolate until they return a negative test.
Ardern decided to lift the lockdown. She said the testing showed no widespread outbreak, ‘‘but rather a small chain of transmission’’ which was manageable by normal contact tracing and testing procedures.
The Government would not use higher alert levels to manage cases once they had a ‘‘good handle’’ on them, she said.
Bloomfield recommended, and Cabinet agreed, that Auckland would drop to alert level 2 overnight, and the rest of the country would drop to Level 1.
He said it was encouraging that all five cases, including two new ones announced that day, remained in a ‘‘tight configuration’’.
Opposition leader Judith Collins was non-committal before the lockdown was lifted, but said there was a need to be wary and avoid any further lockdowns by lifting this one too early.
Experts were mostly supportive of the decision.
Professor Michael Baker, an epidemiologist who has provided advice to the Government in the past, said he thought it was the right decision, but mooted the use of ‘‘2.5’’ and ‘‘1.5’’ alert levels to give control of outbreaks more nuance. The day prior, he said it would be a ‘‘calculated risk’’ to move Auckland from level 3.
Rodney Jones, an economist and modeller who had informally advised the Government throughout the pandemic, said before the decision that it appeared there was a strong possibility the lockdown had been a false alarm.
‘‘If it’s zero cases again tomorrow this has been a false alarm – no worse than Northland,’’ Jones told Stuff.
Thursday, February 18 – no new community cases, 28 close contact test results outstanding
There were no new community cases the day after lockdown lifted. Contact tracing had counted 135 close contacts of the six Covid-19 cases, and 28 test results were still pending.
There were 1490 ‘‘casual-plus’’ contacts at PHS of which 91 still needed to be tested. A further 93 tests were outstanding for the 444 staff connected to LSG SkyChef. The remainder had tested negative. Bloomfield said the swift response from the system continued to be ‘‘highly effective’’ in response to the outbreak.
National Party Covid-19 spokesperson Chris Bishop said the Government’s decision to move so swiftly out of alert level 3 was ‘‘bold’’. ‘‘I was expecting, I think many people were expecting a couple more days just to get a sense of things . . . [with] three new community cases on the same day as the level changes was announced – that struck me as a little bit unusual.’’
Friday, February 19 – one new community case
Another community case, labelled Case G, connected to the second Covid-19 case tested positive on Friday, February 19. This person, a household contact of D, E, and F, and had already been selfisolating so was not of major concern. There remained 16 test results outstanding from the 128 close contacts of all the cluster’s cases, and another 63 of the casual plus contacts from PHS.
Of the 444 LSG SkyChef workers, 59 results were pending.
Saturday, February 20, 21, 22 – no new community cases, alert level 1 for Auckland
For three days there were no new community cases.
Saturday marked the start of the Covid-19 vaccine rollout to border staff. Bloomfield said 25 vaccinators were given the Pfizer vaccine. By Monday, Cabinet was ready to lift Auckland out of Covid-19 alert level 2.
Ardern had no concerns at all about the latest case – they were within a family that had cases and were in a quarantine facility.
With 72,368 tests since the original outbreak, eight cases that were all linked, and wastewater testing producing no evidence of further spread, Ardern said the city could at midnight join the rest of the country at alert level 1.
There would be an ongoing requirement that face coverings be worn on public transport.
There remained three close contacts to be tested, 17 tests of casual-plus contacts at PHS to come, and 55 from the LSG SkyChef workers.
Tuesday, February 23 – one new community case, a Papatoetoe student that was missed
A new case was discovered. Labelled Case I, Hipkins said the case was a casual-plus contact of an original case, and a PHS student. Later in the day two siblings of the day’s original case were confirmed with Covid-19.
Worryingly, one of the cases was working at Kmart Botany, and the list of casual-plus contacts expanded to include 31 staff and an unknown number who visited the store over several days. This unknown number would turn into more than 1700 people.
Bloomfield the following day, confirmed that the student was one of 11 students at Papatoetoe High School that health officials had not been able to contact since February 14. Health officials had not attempted to visit the home of this student after repeatedly failing to reach her by phone.
‘‘I don’t think there was a point of failure. There were repeated efforts . . . My understanding is there weren’t any visits done before the end of the weekend, but that is now happening,’’ Bloomfield said.
Wednesday, February 24 – no new community case
Hipkins said at least half of the PHS community members had returned negative results.
The final group outstanding from the first round of testing from the original case was still being followed up: ‘‘Every effort is being made that they get their test, and they remain in isolation for the full 14 days.’’
Bloomfield said contact tracing identified 126 close contacts associated with cases A to H: all bar three had been tested and returned negative tests. One still remained to be tracked down.
Of the 1496 casual-plus contacts from the initial school case, 1487 had returned at least one negative test. There were 874 people who contacted Healthline saying they were present in relevant locations and times related to these cases. They were required to stay home for the 14 days and be tested at days five and 12, Bloomfield said.
Thursday, February 25 – no new community case
There were no new community cases. However, now 1236 people had been advised to isolate for two weeks after visiting the Kmart store where the positive case was working.
Friday, February 26 – one new community case
A new community Covid-19 case, labelled Case L, came from the household of the previous three new cases.
Case L had worked at KFC Botany Downs while potentially infectious, and should also have been isolating. This meant 11 staff would need to get tested and selfisolate for 14 days, along with their household contacts.
Walk-in customers had to selfisolate for 14 days and get tested on days five and 12. Anybody who used the drive-through during the affected time would have to stay at home until they received a negative day-five test.
By now a total of 1742 people had reported being at Kmart at the times of interest, with 1073 negative test results for the group.
Despite the rising number of possible contacts, and concern that people weren’t financially supported enough to self-isolate, Ardern appeared unfazed by the latest case.
She said health officials knew the source of the cases, and they knew where there may have been contact with others. The latest case had not changed her mind about whether the level should have gone down.
‘‘We can reach out, tell people who might be at risk, get them home, isolating and tested.’’
Saturday, February 27 – two new community cases
Case M was discovered, likely contagious but non-isolating since the preceding Sunday, February 21. Bloomfield said there was another new case, Case N, his mother, who had delivered an early positive result.
Ardern said Case M was a sibling of a student from PHS who had tested negative three times. This school connection was likely how he caught the disease, but they could not be sure.
Because the person was infectious for as long as a week and had not been in isolation, she warned ‘‘we may well have close contacts who are already infected’’. The 21-year-old had gone to the gym after getting a Covid-19 test on Friday afternoon, she said. He had also attended classes at Manukau Institute of Technology while infectious.
She said everything had been working till the latest case, but a ‘‘contributing factor’’ to the alert level shift was that Case M had not stayed in isolation as expected.