New Zealand retreats from plan to open borders

New Zealand’s government is rethinking plans to reopen the country’s border as ministers scramble to stamp out an outbreak of the Delta variant of Covid-19.

The proposed phased reopening of the country was set out by Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern last month, when New Zealand was a “Delta-free haven”, as Bloomberg noted at the time. Ardern suggested that vaccinated travellers from low-risk countries would be allowed to skip quarantine and enter the country from early next year.

“We will use the remainder of 2021 to continue to prepare for the operation of borders under this system,” she said.

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But now “the likelihood of New Zealand reopening its border to the world any time soon is looking less promising”, as local cases of the highly infectious Delta variant increase, said The Guardian.

The country recorded 15 new coronavirus infections in the community on Wednesday, bringing the total reported during the most recent outbreak to 855.

New Zealand has won widespread praise for its zero-Covid policy, which saw Ahern declaring in April 2020 that the coronavirus had been “eliminated” from her country. The border has been closed to foreigners since the pandemic began and all returning residents have been forced to stay in managed isolation facilities for two weeks.

In July, New Zealand suspended a quarantine-free travel bubble with neighbouring Australia in response to Delta-driven outbreaks there.

Amid rising confidence about the success of the restrictions, the government in Wellington had planned to begin a phased reopening that would “stratify countries based on risk”, Chris Hipkins, the minister leading New Zealand’s Covid response, told Parliament yesterday.

But in the “Delta environment, we actually have to consider whether, in fact, that’s an appropriate thing to do [because] all countries, all people coming into the country at this point, have a degree of risk associated with them”, he continued.

Despite such concerns, internal restrictions are being eased as Covid case numbers begin to decline. However, while “a return to zero case days appears feasible”, according to the Daily Mail, Ardern this week cautioned against complacency, calling for compliance with Covid rules and increased community testing.