Covid 19 coronavirus: Fox News anchor Laura Ingraham attacks New Zealand’s Covid response

A right-wing television presenter in the United States has spread misinformation about New Zealand’s response to the Covid-19 pandemic, sharing an old clip of Jacinda Ardern and claiming that the government is “throwing people into quarantine camps.”

Laura Ingraham, host of Fox News’ The Ingraham Angle, made the claims on her show yesterday, joining a growing number of right-wing experts abroad who are presenting New Zealand’s response as a threat to freedom.

“The American left and its media poodles have long held up New Zealand as the model for how to properly deal with many things, including Covid, but anyone who loves freedom should take note because kiwis have a terrifying new response to the growing Covid case numbers, “Ingraham said.

“They are throwing people into quarantine camps.”

“Don’t leave camp until you’re negative,” adds Ingraham, with a fake New Zealand accent.

To back up her claims, Ingraham shared an old Facebook live clip of Jacinda Ardern, originally posted more than four months ago.

In that clip, Ardern answers questions from viewers and details the government’s policy of requiring those in quarantine to remain until they return a negative result and enforcing their continued stay if they decline a test.

What Ingraham calls “quarantine camps” are, in fact, our managed isolation hotels.

The clip was shared by Ardern in June, after New Zealand defeated community broadcasting for the first time on June 8.

Ingraham used it to suggest that the policy was new and in response to the “increasing number of Covid cases.”

The number of Covid cases in New Zealand has remained low by global standards and our community transmission cases have been well contained since we successfully battled our first wave earlier this year.

Yesterday, a right-wing British politician outraged Kiwis online after he compared New Zealand to Nazi Germany in a series of tweets targeting Jacinda Ardern and the government’s response to Covid.

Suzanne Evans, a former journalist who jumped from the Conservative Party to the UK Independence Party before leaving politics, regularly shares posts criticizing the use of locks to tackle Covid-19.

Yesterday Evans said that “New Zealand now has a fascist government under @jacindaardern. Are you going to act @ amnesty?”

The comment came over a retweet from fellow lockdown critic Bernie Spofforth, who had shared an edited video containing messages from Dr. Ashley Bloomfield and Ardern about the policy of moving all positive cases to quarantine facilities and enforcing tests.

That video contained the same Facebook live video as the one shared by Ingraham.

The video combined a Bloomfield press conference and Ardern’s Facebook live video and added graphics and memes.

Kiwis who saw the tweet mocked Evans’s critical opinion, with a mocking tweet: “Amnesty, please help us, Jacinda is forcing us to go to shapeshifter concerts in stunning vineyards.

“It’s called a quarantine,” wrote another.

“You may have heard of it. People have used it for thousands of years to quell the spread of disease.”

Another noted that, unlike in many countries, Kiwi children are able to go to school despite the Covid-19 pandemic.

“Did you also know that in New Zealand, under the leadership of Comrade Jacinda Ardern, they send ALL children, even those UNDER FIVE YEARS, to government-mandated educational camps rather than leaving them at home to be educated through Zoom while his parents work from home? It’s horrible. “

Kiwi journalist Giovanni Tiso struck Evans’s blow to our democracy, writing: “A fascist government that was overwhelmingly reelected.”

Others went further.

“Giovanni is lying. Jacinda toppled the existing government in the great” Battle of Mission Bay “(look it up). She alone killed the opposition leader who was riding a Yak. They had to find two other leaders to fight her, but even they could not resist his sorcery. “

Dr. Jin Russell, a developmental pediatrician and a PhD candidate in life course epidemiology at the University of Auckland, took up arms against Spofford’s original tweet, dissecting the “misinformation” in a tweet thread.

In the face of the backlash, Evans doubled down and compared New Zealand to Nazi Germany in the 1930s.

Kiwis were quick to ignore this nonsense with some harsh responses and others criticized Evans’s linking of our Covid response to the horrors of the Holocaust.

New Zealand’s efforts to combat Covid-19 have been widely praised, and the World Health Organization (WHO) recently highlighted the steps New Zealand took to eliminate Covid-19 within the community.

In a four-minute video posted on social media, the WHO details how the country went from its first coronavirus case, on February 28, to the peak of new daily cases at 89, to successfully eliminate the virus in a matter of months. .

The video highlights New Zealand’s plan, including strict lockdown measures, isolation of positive cases and close contacts, as well as the country’s contact tracing method.

It features footage of the Prime Minister’s addresses to the nation, including the Level 4 closure announcement, as well as interviews with some of the country’s leading experts, including Bloomfield.

According to the WHO, New Zealand acted quickly and followed the organization’s guidance on isolation and contact tracing, all of which were key to eliminating the virus.

While Covid-19 numbers continue to rise around the world, with many countries experiencing major resurgences and recording thousands of new cases daily, breaking new records each day, New Zealand continues to tackle small amounts of the virus, with mandatory quarantine for anyone who arrives in the country.