SYDNEY, Australia – As the week began, New Zealanders celebrated 100 days without community spread of the coronavirus, drunk in pubs, packed stadiums and surrounded by friends.
Two days later that changed suddenly: Four new cases, all related, arose in Auckland. On Thursday, officials said the cluster had grown to 17 as they struggled to map out how the virus had returned to an isolated island nation battling its pandemic response.
One theory is that it could come via freight. Some of the infected New Zealanders worked in a cold storage room with imported food. Another focus is quarantine facilities for returning travelers, the source of an outbreak running through Melbourne, Australia.
A mystery and a few cases – that is all it takes for New Zealand to say goodbye to normality. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern immediately announced a new lockdown for Auckland, a city of 1.7 million people, along with an enormous test, contact detection and quarantine flash that aims to launch the Covid-19 for the second time quack.
“Going hard and early is still the best course of action,” Ms Ardern said on Thursday as she refunded her daily coronavirus newsletters. “We have a plan.”
Many other places have faced a similar challenge – Hong Kong, Australia and Vietnam have all faced new waves of early triumphs. New Zealand, though disappointed by the abrupt resurgence, has responded with an extraordinary level of urgency and action that it hopes will be a model for how to eliminate a burst of infection and make it quick with life.
“We were all the way back to hugging, handshaking, restaurants, cinemas – all the stuff, except when we were going on vacation abroad,” said Siouxsie Wiles, a microbiologist at the University of Auckland. “What we’ve had to do in the meantime is to massively test our contacts and contacts, so this will be a real test of how quickly you can put it off again.”
“Everything about the time frame,” she added, “is really compressed.”
Jeremy Hutton, 28, who worked in finance and was traveling on Thursday mornings and had a take-out coffee, asked what was on the minds of many: ‘Are we just going to do this every few months? ”
Mrs Ardern first heard about a potentially positive case on Tuesday at 4pm on Tuesday while traveling in a van a few hours outside the capital, Wellington, after visiting a factory that makes face masks. At 9:15 p.m., she and Dr. appeared. Ashley Bloomfield, the director general of health, at a news conference where she announced the new cases – all four were from the same family; no one had recently returned from abroad – and a lockdown that would begin the next day.
“We have come too far to go backwards,” Ms Ardern said. “Be strong and be friendly.”
The lockdown was initially set for three days. Contact tracing had already begun.
Michael Baker, an epidemiologist who was a leading proponent of New Zealand’s vigorous efforts to eliminate the virus during its first outbreak months ago, said he heard a few hours before the announcement of the new cases. Like many others, he immediately began to try what was wrong.
“The only way a virus can appear in the community in New Zealand is through borders,” he said. ‘It has been eliminated in New Zealand. There’s really no chance it’s lasted the last three months without it being discovered. ”
But what border, how and when? Nobody knows yet.
Dr Bloomfield said on Thursday that those infected in the new cluster first showed symptoms around the end of July, suggesting that the virus had been in the community for at least a week before. Genetic sequencing has found similarities with versions of the virus in Britain and Australia.
To investigate the unproven idea of a cargo spread, health officials tested everyone at Americold, the cold storage company where some of the first cases appeared, with quick results identifying a total of seven workers with the virus . Scientists, aware of how the virus flourished in cool storage at meat-packing plants in other countries, also tested surfaces at the company’s two facilities.
If it turns out that the virus has been moved by freight, then the consequences could be significant for global trade. It can mean deep cleaning and longer waiting times between shipping and delivery, along with more supervision on ships and in ports.
But epidemiologists said such transmission was unpredictable: human-human contact was the most likely source. “Ninety percent of the cases occur in homes and workplaces,” said Drs. Bloomfield.
The growth of the cluster so far points to a path through kitchens and break rooms. One of the new infections reported on Thursday was a student related to a person identified on Tuesday. Another seven are family members of Americold employees.
All those newly infected will be placed in government office facilities, in an escalation over containment measures during New Zealand’s first lockdown in March and April.
New Zealand has apparently learned what not to do from its neighbor and rival Australia, where 800 people who tested positive in Melbourne were recently not found at home during random checks of self-isolation.
Australia’s missteps have also led New Zealand to concentrate on quarantine facilities – in Melbourne, the virus moved from travelers to hotel workers, who then took it home.
Dr Bloomfield said Thursday that workers at all 32 quarantine facilities treating returning travelers will be tested for the virus this week, and once a week thereafter. Workers’ relations can also be checked, along with every border official at New Zealand’s airports and other ports – between 6,000 and 7,000 federal employees.
“It will help us to prevent further and unintended spread in the community,” said Drs. Bloomfield.
The lockdown is intended to do the same, and it is strongly enforced. In their first and a half days, the authorities stopped 17,000 cars at 10 checks. Most traveled for the right reasons – for work, food or care – and only 312 were turned back for trying to leave Auckland or other violations of the rules.
The coronavirus breaks out>
Frequently Asked Questions
Updated August 12, 2020
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Can I travel in the United States?
- Many states have travel restrictions, and many of them are taking active measures to enforce those restrictions, such as issuing fines or requiring visitors to be quarantined for 14 days. Here is an ever-updating list of restrictions across statewide. In general, travel increases your chances of getting and spreading the virus, because you will encounter more people than if you stayed at home in your own ‘pod’. “Staying at home is the best way to protect yourself and others from Covid-19,” the CDC said. However, if you are traveling, take precautionary measures. If you can, drive. If you have to fly, be careful when choosing your airline. But know that airlines are taking real steps to keep planes clean and limit your risk.
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I have antibodies. Am I immune now?
- At the moment, that probably seems like at least several months. There have been horrific accounts of people suffering from what appears to be a second bolt of Covid-19. But experts say these patients may have a prolonged course of infection, with the virus taking a slow toll weeks to months after initial exposure. People infected with the coronavirus typically produce immune molecules called antibodies, which are protective proteins made in response to an infection. These antibodies may last only two to three months in the body, which may seem worrying, but that is perfectly normal after an acute infection progresses, said Dr. Michael Mina, an immunologist at Harvard University. It could possibly get the coronavirus back up, but it is highly unlikely that it would be possible in a short window of time from initial infection or the second time safe.
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I am a small business owner. Can I get relief?
- The incentive bills introduced in March provide assistance to the millions of American small businesses. Those eligible for support are non-profit organizations and organizations with less than 500 workers, including sole proprietorships, independent contractors and freelancers. Some larger companies in some sectors are also eligible. The assistance provided, which is managed by the Small Business Administration, includes the Paycheck Protection Program and the Economic Damage Disaster Program. But many people have not seen payments yet. Even those who have received help are confused: the rules are draconian, and some are stuck on money they do not know how to use. Many small business owners get less than they expected or heard nothing at all.
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What are my rights if I am worried about returning to work?
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What will school look like in September?
- It is unlikely that many schools will return to a regular schedule this fall, requiring the grinding of online learning, easy childcare and stunted workdays to continue. The two largest public school districts of California – Los Angeles and San Diego – said on July 13 that instruction will be remote only in the fall, citing concerns that growing coronavirus infections in their areas pose too great a risk to students and teachers. Together, the two districts enroll about 825,000 students. They are the largest in the country to date to abandon plans for even a partial physical return to classes when they reopen in August. For other districts, the solution will not be an all-or-nothing approach. Many systems, including the nation’s largest, New York City, are creating hybrid plans that include some days in classrooms and other days online. There is no national policy yet, so check regularly with your municipal school system to see what is happening in your municipality.
On Ponsonby Road, a high-end and normally busy shopping street, the city seemed to be rapidly shifting back into the form of a partial hibernation.
Roscoe Thorby, 58, drank his cool coffee in a deck chair he had set up on the sidewalk outside his regular cafe, just as he had done at the first lockdown.
But for some companies, the sudden pivot of life as normal to almost total shutdown has been difficult.
“It’s pretty devastating, after having a taste of what it’s like to go back to normalcy, roll the ball and get things going,” said Hugo Baird, 29, who is a cafe hat, Honey Bones, and part of a restaurant called Lilian.
Serving customers is financially possible for the cafe, but not for the restaurant. It is closed for this lockdown, how long it will last, and the first victim will be all the food his staff had prepared for this week’s service, as well as open bottles of wine and beer kegs.
“It’s the uncertainty that kills business,” Mr Baird said. He had finally returned to run at full capacity. “Now, moving on to another lockdown, even though some people said it was inevitable, does damage to trust.”
Yet, despite the new cases, many New Zealanders acknowledged their jealous position. John Coop, 48, an architect, said he had recently spoken to a friend in London, and “there was a stark difference between his reality and what it is here.”
“We are incredibly grateful,” he added.
Dr Baker, the epidemiologist, said New Zealand’s prior success, and the continued elimination of the virus in other places, such as Taiwan and Fiji, suggested room for optimism. He said the latest outbreak could be small and be brought under control soon.
“The government moved incredibly quickly and decisively with the lockdown,” he said. “If there are no removed chains for transmission, they will peter out.”
Mr. While his ‘heart fell’, he said, when the news of the new cases arrived, he supported the government’s aggressive response.
“I think we are sensible, and I think we trust the government,” he said. “We have had no reason not to trust our government.”
Damien Cave reported from Sydney, and Serena Solomon from Auckland, New Zealand.
