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Officials have defended the Covid-19 border regime as huge demand outstrips wait times for foreign kiwis to enter their homeland.
Air Commodore Darryn Webb. Source: 1 NEWS
There is no availability on New Zealand’s mandatory 14-day hotel-run isolation and quarantine program, or MIQ, until the end of February.
That means kiwis eager to go home won’t leave isolation until March, more than 12 weeks away.
Outgoing MIQ chief Darryn Webb said no additional hotels would be installed beyond the current 32 employees to meet demand.
“It’s a finite system … and it’s extremely complex to put it all together,” he said.
“It requires the right infrastructure to ensure the right standards are met, the right workforce from both a health perspective and a safety perspective.
“What we have really is very close, if not fair, to the maximum capacity that we can sustain.
“4,500 rooms is a significant number. Per capita undoubtedly outnumbers many of our partners, Australia for example.”
The government budgeted $ 499 million for the MIQ system this year, and Webb said they were “following the budget.”
On Friday, Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk said Kiwis were now free to enter her state without a 14-day isolation, joining with NSW and NT to create a one-way travel corridor from New Zealand.
New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has yet to give in opening the door on this extreme, and the NZ Herald reports that she has ruled out a trans-Tasman bubble until February at the earliest.
In the regional city of Woodville on Friday, Ardern denied there was a specific deadline, but agreed that she was being cautious when crossing the border.
“I don’t want to take risks that endanger the freedoms we have,” he said.
Free movement through Tasmania would be a great boost for business, tourism, and people eager to see their loved ones.
It would also eliminate New Zealand’s MIQ accumulation, as around 40 percent of the stocks are kiwis in Australia.
Ardern’s caution is in line with the country’s Covid-19 elimination strategy.
The government has concerns about how Australian states could lock themselves in should future outbreaks occur, and about the ramifications of closing the borders again once they are open, leaving many on both sides of the Tasman.
The game changer in this situation is the arrival of a vaccine.
Covid-19 vaccines are being rolled out in Europe and North America, and will arrive in New Zealand and Australia in early 2021.
The chief scientific adviser to the Ministry of Health, Ian Town, said the vaccine would not allow people to bypass MIQ, perhaps until “the middle to the second half of next year.”
“That’s a question we haven’t answered yet, it’s an obvious question,” Town said.
“What we need to know is the effective efficacy, if we can use that term, of the vaccine in the medium and long term and how long those effects will last.”
Chief Health Officer Dr. Ashley Bloomfield said it was “too early” to plan to downsize or shut down the MIQ system.
