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New Zealand is expected to exclude New South Wales from its non-quarantine travel bubble with Australia when it resumes as cases continue to rise in the wake of the Bondi outbreak.
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said Breakfast Monday morning she predicted the bubble would pick up soon, with the exception of New South Wales, where the number of cases is the highest. She said the government may introduce new preventive measures, including pre-departure testing.
New Zealand officials said on Saturday that the bubble would be suspended until midnight Tuesday, the first time travel has been suspended with all of Australia since the deal began.
The announcement came as new cases were announced in a series of Australian states and territories. Sydney’s cluster of cases grew to 110 over the weekend, and local cases were also recorded in Queensland, Western Australia and the Northern Territory.
There are now several cases and outbreaks in Australia in different stages of containment and the health risk to New Zealand in response to these cases is increasing, the office of Covid-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins said, in a press release. The government has taken the precautionary step of temporarily widening the current break with New South Wales to include all of Australia.
Hipkins acknowledged the frustration and inconvenience that comes with this break.
Given the high level of transmissibility of what appears to be the Delta variant, and the fact that there are now several community clusters, this is the right thing to do to keep Covid-19 out of New Zealand, a- he declared.
New Zealanders stranded in Australia must follow the health guidelines of the state or territory in which they are located, and anyone returning from Australia to New Zealand after June 21 must monitor their health, the said. Hipkins office.
The statement noted that New Zealand remained[s] has pledged to quarantine free travel to Australia.
Wellington is still on Alert Level 2, a week after an infected Australian tourist came to the city and visited a number of busy cafes, bars, restaurants and museums. The man had received a dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine, which could make him less likely to have transmitted the virus, but the man’s partner, who initially returned a negative test, reported a positive test on Sunday, indicating that ‘he could have been infectious towards the end of his visit. Wellington has so far recorded no cases in the community, and no Covid-19 in the sewage, but Hipkins said on Friday the city was not out of the woods yet and people should remain vigilant about to symptoms.
Under Level 2 conditions, gatherings of more than 100 people are prohibited and businesses can remain open if social distancing guidelines are followed. Masks are mandatory on public transport and encouraged in indoor spaces like supermarkets, especially where social distancing is difficult to enforce.
The break in travel between New Zealand and Australia will be a blow to some tour operators who were hoping for increased visitor numbers for the next ski season. NZSki chief executive Paul Anderson told RNZ that Australians account for 30-40% of our revenue in the normal season and almost half of the bookings have been lost due to disrupted travel.
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