‘Light at the end of the tunnel’: New Zealand welcomes plans to reopen borders | New Zealand

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New Zealand’s long-awaited, albeit cautious, roadmap to reopening its borders has given businesses and families a taste of hope for the future, although health experts warn it depends on improving the country’s vaccination strategy to reach vulnerable communities.

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern laid out plans to reopen at a forum in Wellington on Thursday, 17 months after borders were closed in March 2020.

Ardern noted that, all is well, immunized travelers from low-risk countries will be allowed to skip quarantine and enter the country early next year. Travelers from medium-risk countries will undergo some form of self-isolation or a shorter quarantine hotel stay, while MIQ will still be required for those coming from high-risk countries, or those who have not been vaccinated.

The proposals are based on an accelerated vaccine rollout in the next few months as the country seeks to avoid the lockdowns currently taking place in Australia.

Business leader and former Air New Zealand CEO Rob Fyfe said he was encouraged that the strategy was a “clear signal of intent to open up”.

“I was hoping it would happen before Christmas, but with Delta and what happened across Tasman, if we open early and have to close another, it would be a disaster from a business perspective,” he said.

To prepare for a phased reopening, Fyfe said companies need to do everything they can to support people to get vaccinated, including allowing people to get vaccinated or if they are sick, educating employees about its importance and providing Covid-19 tracer QR codes.

“There is a lot we can do in business to encourage and support the pursuit of our freedoms to return to living our lives as close as we were before the Covid pandemic,” said Fyfe.

“It appears that there is light at the end of the tunnel, but we don’t know how long we have to go,” said Dr. Julia Albrecht, a tourism expert at the University of Otago. “It will be interesting to see if our largely Covid-free status makes us more attractive,” she added.

But she also cautioned that there is still a lot of uncertainty. “We need to wait and see how difficult the border operations are, and also the costs that may be associated with it.”

Health experts in the Pacifica and Maori islands warn that the reopening plan hinges on reaching vulnerable communities, and that will require better technologies.

Dr. Abi Talimaituga, one of the health leaders at Pacifica, said equity must continually drive the approach to vaccination, starting with education about the vaccine.

“Vaccine hesitation gets a lot — but [the vaccine] Something new, it will affect people. I think educating our communities is really important so they appreciate this virus and how harmful it is.”

He added that it was critical that the vaccination program be community-led.

“We have the infrastructures there – schools, churches, public practices, health providers in the Pacific – who don’t travel at night – they’ve been around for 20 to 30 years and our communities trust them.”

Using an environment that attracts people from the Pacific Islands would be a better approach to increasing uptake, he said, and cited Pacific Vaccination Day, which saw 830 people get their first dose, as a good example.

“In Puerto there’s been music, Pacific Cay and yes, I’ve got a vaccine — there’s a lot we can do and we need to get smarter.”

Dr. Maya Brewerton, a Māori immunologist, said that in te ao Māori (Māori world), family and community take precedence.

“We need to focus on those who don’t get the vaccine… to get to those people.”

This approach, she said, should include talking to those communities to find out what the barriers are.

From October, vaccinated workers will be able to participate in a pilot program where they can travel abroad and self-isolate at home, instead of going through the current mandatory two weeks of government-run isolation (MIQ).

Epidemiologist Sir David Skege, who led an advisory group that reopened, said he was very encouraged that the government had heeded expert advice to take a cautious approach to reopening.

But he said self-isolation would look much different than how New Zealand has done self-isolation in the past due to the highly contagious nature of the delta variant.

“People kind of say ‘Okay, as long as someone’s vaccinated, is isolating at home,’ and they kind of forget that vaccination isn’t 100 percent effective, and the kind of isolation we had before isn’t going to cut the mustard,” she said.

“For this beta, only people will be able to isolate on their own. I mean, there are two issues — one is making sure people really stay home…but also it’s going to be very difficult I think for people to isolate in a family home.”

As of Wednesday, about 34% of New Zealand’s population aged 16 and over had received a first dose, and 20% had been fully vaccinated.

Ardern said the opening now could have serious consequences for the country.

She did not give a figure for the level of vaccination required to reopen, but said the country would need good nationwide coverage, including geographical spread and strong vaccination rates between at-risk and high-risk groups.

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