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NEW Zealand (NZ) on Tuesday (12/21) postponed plans for a gradual reopening of borders until the end of February 2022 due to concerns over the rapid global spread of the Omicron variant of COVID-19.
The South Pacific nation has just begun to relax some of its pandemic measures and its international border restrictions will be further relaxed from January, with all foreign tourists allowed into the country from April.
Minister for COVID-19 Response Chris Hipkins at a press conference in Wellington said non-quarantine travel, which will be open to New Zealanders in Australia from January 16, would be postponed until the end of February. All evidence so far points to Omicron as the most infectious variant of COVID-19.
“No doubt this is disappointing and will disrupt many vacation plans, but it’s important to clearly define these changes today so they can have time to consider those plans,” Hipkins said.
Hipkins explained that this was a precautionary measure because it was still not clear how badly infected people had Omicron and its impact on the health system was not fully understood.
New Zealand also said the length of stay in state quarantine facilities would be increased from a week to 10 days. The pre-departure test requirement for entering New Zealand was reduced from 72 hours to 48 hours before travel.
National carrier Air New Zealand said it would cancel about 120 services through the end of February as planned reopenings were delayed, affecting some 27,000 customers.
Meanwhile Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said the decision was taken to give the government more time to prepare for Omicron. Unfortunately, this is not the case if (spread in New Zealand) but when it is very easy to spread. So, we did everything we could to make sure we were ready.
The Omicron variant was first detected last month in southern Africa and Hong Kong and has spread at lightning speed to at least 89 countries so far. New Zealand has reported 22 cases with the Omicron variant but all are in border quarantine facilities and there are no community cases yet. [antaranews/photo special]
