Covid 19 Coronavirus: Eighteen Ways New Zealand Can Strengthen Its Border

Experts have come up with a number of improvements, including suspension of travel from mass-infected countries, they say would strengthen New Zealand’s borders against Covid-19.

In a new blog post, a public health team from the University of Otago argued that now was an “excellent time” for the newly elected government to conduct a systematic review to limit the threat of more New Zealand outbreaks.

“The persistent emergence of cross-border pandemic virus raids, five since 1 August, including a large outbreak in Auckland, highlights the need for such a review,” wrote Drs. Jennifer Summers and Amanda Kvalsvig, and Professors Nick Wilson and Michael Baker. . .

While acknowledging that New Zealand had outperformed in eradicating the virus, the experts offered a list of possible changes for the government to consider.

One was to ban all travelers from countries with high levels of uncontrolled spread, such as the US, UK, India, until the prevalence of infection in travelers was low.

“This was the approach taken by New Zealand in February 2020, although it does not apply to New Zealand passport holders,” they said.

“The simplest legal action could be to prohibit, when possible, any flight originating in these countries.”

Alternatively, they suggested that the legislation could empower the government to restrict the rights of Kiwi passport holders to return home in pandemic circumstances.

You could also consider pre-flight quarantine and testing, via PCR or rapid antigen testing, for travelers from the worst affected countries.

This measure was already being used in countries such as Cyprus, Bermuda, Hong Kong and Italy, and the Health Ministry has been analyzing whether New Zealand should adopt the policy.

Experts suggested that a pilot program could focus on travel from a “high risk” country and then expand.

While travelers on flights to New Zealand are already required to wear the mask, they said the rules could be further refined, such as not talking when removing masks to eat and drink.

While previous work has shown that the risk of the virus being introduced by international aircrew was low, they also saw the need for an updated review of it.

A separate review could be carried out of what happened when they landed – especially on bus trips and domestic flights to managed isolation and quarantine (MIQ) facilities outside Auckland.

They listed possible adjustments to MIQ facilities, including considering electronic wristbands and whether a centralized hub, such as at RNZAF Base Ohakea, could replace hotels.

Authorities also needed to re-evaluate how the virus spread within MIQ facilities and analyze whether the 14-day isolation time could be drastically reduced for those willing to self-quarantine at home, provided they could be tracked digitally.

Taiwan, for example, was able to closely monitor quarantined people at home via personal phones or phones provided by the government.

“The Taiwanese authorities are also mandated to carry out home checks on quarantined people,” they said.

“Those who violate home quarantine rules are admitted to a quarantine institution and face substantial fines.”

Elsewhere, they pointed to a different threat from international shipping crews, who are currently allowed to fly to New Zealand and transit ships directly, without going through the usual quarantine and tests required for regular travelers.

That risk was the center of attention this month with the infection of a marine engineer who was working on a cargo ship on the same day that a group of newly arrived sailors came aboard.

They said a greater focus on the possibility of infected cargo was also needed, one of three possible explanations for the August outbreak in Auckland.

When it came to detecting the virus more quickly at borders, experts came up with a number of options.

Those were implementing rapid antigen tests when they became effective enough and were testing border workers more frequently, even daily, while requiring weekly health reports from their close contacts.

There could even be scope to use smart technology like the Kiwi-designed elarm app to detect symptoms early, or train detector dogs, they said.

Outside the community, health authorities could expand surveillance for respiratory illnesses outside of the flu season and begin widespread testing at sewage stations for traces of the virus.

“New Zealand has made progress in this field with the ESR work, but it still seems relatively slow compared to the work in Australia where this surveillance system is already in use.”

To boost control of future outbreaks, they said New Zealand could catch up with other countries like Singapore and bring in new technology to aid contact tracing, such as the long-awaited Bluetooth-enabled CovidCard.

Our alert level settings could also change.

“For example, at a new ‘alert level 1.5’ there could be mandatory use of masks in all indoor public settings,” they said.

“Environments with a relatively high risk of transmission (bars, nightclubs, gyms, churches) could have restrictions in terms of the number of people inside, ventilation requirements and various opening hours.”

Finally, they asked the authorities to issue reports of violations at the MIQ facilities much faster, since journalists had to use the requests of the Official Information Law to obtain them.

“In summary, there appear to be many ways in which a further reduction in the risk of Covid-19 outbreaks in New Zealand seems possible,” they concluded.

“Given the potential costs of failure, for example the likely high economic and welfare costs of the recent August outbreak in Auckland, it would seem prudent for the New Zealand government to fully evaluate all these options.”