Southern hopes for level drop

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and Director-General of Health Ashley Bloomfield. Photo: NZ Herald
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and Director-General of Health Ashley Bloomfield. Photo: NZ Herald
Southerners are hoping another day of no Covid-19 cases in the South Island will translate into a drop in alert levels being announced this afternoon.

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern will today announce the Cabinet’s decision on whether to extend Level 4 beyond tonight.

The decision will affect all of New Zealand apart from Auckland, which will remain in Level 4 until at least Tuesday.

Business South chief executive Mike Collins said businesses felt if there were no cases in the South Island, "it would be hard to justify us remaining at Level 4".

"Level 3 can still be a messy time for businesses and schools, some can operate with click and collect but some still can’t operate."

Level 3 would get more business activity going, but it was still not ideal.

"They would prefer Level 2 as soon as possible."

However, businesses were realistic that could be some weeks away yet, he said.

Dunedin businesswoman Sarah Hussey, who along with husband Patrick owns The Swan taproom and eatery, The Perc Central and The Perc Exchange, had her fingers crossed for an alert level drop.

Ideally, that would be down to Level 2, but she felt Level 3 by Monday was more realistic.

Businesses such as cafes that would be able to sell takeaways would need time to prepare after more than a week closed.

They would likely open The Perc Central in Stuart St at Level 3, as they did last time, Mrs Hussey said.

"It went really well - rain, hail, people were coming."

Dunedin Mayor Aaron Hawkins said he would love to see some certainty about when alert levels would drop.

"For all the social and economic wellbeing benefits that would come from that, but more importantly I would love for us to be in a position where we can do that safely, which means knowing enough about the current outbreak and contacts."

The uncertainty was difficult, particularly for sectors such as hospitality that could operate under Level 3 but needed some lead-in time to prepare.

He said level shifts had tended to move by degrees, and he did not anticipate a shift below Level 3 at this stage.

For Invercargill deputy mayor Nobby Clark, a move to Level 3 would be helpful.

"I hope we take a South Island approach as opposed to a New Zealand approach.

"If we don’t have any recorded cases in the South Island, I’d hope the Prime Minister and the director-general would move us down a level."

Queenstown Lakes Mayor Jim Boult said going into lockdown was the right call, but if there continued to be no cases in the South Island, it would be good for that to change locally.

"I also wonder about Level 3 - as somebody put it, that’s Level 4 with takeaways. It really isn’t going to do a lot for our economy.

"We kind of wonder whether there’s a Level 2 and a-half, which kind of enables us to get some activity going in the district."

Prof Shaun Hendy, a Covid-19 modeller at the University of Auckland, said he expected Auckland to stay in Alert Level 4 lockdown for "multiple weeks".

A North Island and South Island split would make sense, he said, referring to a change in alert levels between the two islands.

Whether the South Island dropped alert levels would depend on wastewater tests, where close contacts from Auckland had travelled, and whether the testing rates were high enough in those areas, he said.

Director-general of health Dr Ashley Bloomfield said he could not see anything happening other than a step down to Level 3 for anywhere outside Auckland - when it happened.

A shift to Level 3 would mean children up to 14 who could not be supervised by an adult at home could return to school.

Otago Secondary Principals’ Association president Lindy Cavanagh-Monaghan said schools had good stocks of things like sanitiser and masks so, from a practical perspective, they were well prepared for a shift in levels.

"The difficulties will be around the lack of predictability of what numbers we’re expecting because that could be different to last time, particularly in rural areas coming into busy times on farms," she said.

"There might be some staff who are anxious about coming back on-site, so managing our personnel will be a challenge as well."

daisy.hudson@odt.co.nz

Comments

Nobby. No Auckland money.

Why would anyone want a drop to level 3? It is pretty much just as tyrannically oppressive on your rights as level 4 except you have to go to work. There is no reason the south island can't be level 1 after a year of no cases. The govt has just normalized these inhane methods of control, it's dangerous

Sweden has never locked down nor mandated masks.

Has Sweden collapsed?

They are 30th in terms of deaths per capita from Covid. Countries with repeat lockdowns including the UK and Canada are well above them.

Go figure!

But but but there is "covid" in the wastewater, no way will the govt relax their grip with that going on....

 

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