Can someone explain to me New Zealand?

[idontknow54789]

Sorry for the ignorance/naivety here but can someone explain to me the reasonings behind such extreme lockdown measures in NZ? At the beginning of the pandemic they're approach was fully accepted but surely now with vaccines and omnicrom being a 'milder' form of covid they have to start setting sense? Is it about the health system? I understand there's a severe lack of ICU beds but is locking down so much really better for health? Can anyone explain it to me please?

@Slinkymalinky03 100%

There are people in NZ that are ok in their little bubble. That's great for them but if they had a son, daughter or parents that they couldn't see for 2 years they might feel a bit differently as to how things are now being handled.

mumsnet has become a haven for anti-vaxers who want to see the bodies piled high everywhere. Personally I see NZ's strategy as more sensible than ours apart from not letting their own people back in. They should have had more quarantine beds or allowed people to isolate in their own homes - tag them if necessary with the type of tag prisoners get to ensure they stayed there. And you dont allow in the rich with special exemptions for them.

The NHS treats junior doctors here disgustingly. It would be easy to recruit some with pandemic experience to expand capacity. If you wanted special exemptions for anyone it should be them.

Couple of misconceptions here too - recently released data shows reduced risk of long covid in the vaccinated. There are some people who cannot safely be vaccinated but many highly allergic people have had covid vaccines with nothing more than a sore arm.

@Cactusandmarshmallows

What an odd thread.

I'm in NZ and things really don't feel that strict at all.

I can't shake the feeling that many in the UK need the NZ response to be wrong because to admit otherwise is to also admit that more could have been done to save so many lives over the past two years.

^this a million times.

If anyone has not they absolutely should read the UK health select committee’s report on our covid response. It’s so fucking stark and shameful. I’m sure people have forgotten just how woeful this government have been.

There are plenty of other countries who’ve done a better job than the UK. It’s not hard to find examples.

Of course the outcome is different

Why wouldn’t it be given variables for each country

As i said, they are very different places but 60 deaths compared to 12,000 (even 15,000 by some estimates) is still a HUGE difference for the same population

I can't shake the feeling that many in the UK need the NZ response to be wrong because to admit otherwise is to also admit that more could have been done to save so many lives over the past two years.

This is just ridiculous. The UK and NZ are so different — one super-connected with the rest of the world, one isolated: one with Covid established before it was known to exist, one Covid-free: one with with a large multi-cultural population used to travelling all over the world visiting family, the other with a tiny much more culturally homogenous population — that it's pointless to compare them and the comparison should never have been made.

It was galling for those of us here in the UK with a decent knowledge of NZ that anyone could imagine it was possible or desirable for us to do what the Kiwis did but I don't think anyone who knows and loves NZ wants it or its people to suffer.

@Flaxmeadow

Of course the outcome is different

Why wouldn’t it be given variables for each country

As i said, they are very different places but 60 deaths compared to 12,000 (even 15,000 by some estimates) is still a HUGE difference for the same population

It really is a huge difference and that is down to can you close your borders effectively?

You are much better off looking at comparable countries in Europe than NZ

In terms of timing, border control, international visits and so on

Another way to look at it is Melbourne and length of lockdown if a few cases get in - which shows how it would pan out here with road freight. I like threads about NZ and how people are feeling there but they always end up with these sorts if comparisons and have done for the entire time.

@milkyaqua

I find the complacency in the UK, as expressed on MN at least, equally confounding.

Many of us have had or have currently got Covid and it's hard to be scared of something that you've experienced as a very mild illness indeed.

It's not a binary - complacent versus scared.

@milkyaqua

It's not a binary - complacent versus scared.

What’s the mood like in Aus?

More vigilant or about the same level of people just living fairly normally, similar to here

So what do you mean by complacency?

@MarshaBradyo I know they’re not going for zero covid - but that’s my point - 24 days isolation for household cases is something that makes sense for a zero covid strategy - a shorter isolation makes sense for a “let omicron in but at a slower pace to not overwhelm health services” strategy. Therefore I just don’t see the logic behind it - it’s a confused strategy.

Also everyone saying NZers are happy with the situation, I have lots of NZer friends and 100% of them are not happy with the covid response now. So I think it’s good to consider that we are all in our own bubbles of like minded people and can’t really speak for the whole of NZ.

@nettie434

The thing that has been puzzling me is how the omicron variant actually entered New Zealand when entry restrictions are so strict.

I am sorry for people who have not been able to visit family. I think the USA had the fairest policy in that until travel restrictions were lifted last November, US citizens could enter the country but tourists/business travellers could not.

The US is very respectful of its' citizens/PR's rights. Throughout the pandemic, they've had the right to travel to/from the US and they don't have to be vaccinated to do so - a valid PCR/LFT showing negative status is all that is required.

Personally, I wouldn't want citizenship of any country that would arbitrarily ban its own citizens from returning/visiting. Requiring a negative test and quarantine is one thing, but just not allowing them back in - that blows my mind. NZ citizens not being able to visit their sick/dying relatives? WTAF???

So much misinformation is out there about NZ. Most of the country has been living with relatively few
Restrictions for the last two years. We are not in lockdown, many businesses seem to be doing pretty well. The restrictions around masks, gatherings, vaccination passes are straightforward and sensible if you agree with vaccination. The governments strategy is not around elimination and hasn't been for a long time. It is about achieving a controlled spread to protect our health services. And the government has been very
Firm on restrictions applying to everyone There are no government lockdown parties here and of course the PM cancelled
her wedding. It's not about being a martyr. It's about accountability. Furthermore, surely she can have any kind of wedding she wants - it's not like she is asking the taxpayer to pay for it.

The situation at the border is tricky. However many many cases have been picked up at the border and this stance has certainly stopped the virus flooding the country. It's hard for those awaiting a MIQ spot, but for many, they are wanting to 'come home' after a long period overseas because they are now seeing NZ as safer. It's only safer because of border controls. As for wanting to come into NZ to attend to your rental properties, well you might want to get over yourself or 'cry me a river' as MP Julie-Ann Genter said not that long ago. While our health services are vulnerable and our Māori communities suffering sub standard health outcomes, no one is going to be terribly bothered about letting in an overseas landlord to attend to their holiday lets.

What is out of control is the vitriol towards the democratically elected PM. Threats to kill her or rape her. Misogynistic name calling. She has done so well to rise above it and would not receive this wild offensive hate if she were a man. She makes the opposition leaders look like graceless oafs and her verbal destruction of the smugly bigoted leader of the National Party was a joy to behold. My main problem with Jacinda is the relationship between Labour and the Greens. She doesn't pull up the Greens when they are disrespectful and dismissive of anyone who isn't like them - ie people who are not young and urban.

It does amaze me how many people are so invested in NZ failing to survive the pandemic with any kind of success, to the point it makes the news in the UK media. Good old colonialism with Mother England not being able to bear things being done differently and daring to restrict movement into NZ.

@milkyaqua You can take your accusations of complacency and just bugger off. Many here in the UK are still extremely cautious and careful even if they're not in the higher-risk categories.

I'm trying to organise a group event for a friend's 50th in May. Loads of people say they want to come — but then say that they will only come if the event is outdoors and if they can manage to get there and back on the same day because they're not doing overnight accommodation. Even though they're vaccinated and boosted and the restrictions have been lifted, they're not taking any risks. And they want everyone to take an LFT before they attend. I think it's clear from the WFH threads that a lot of people have no intention of getting back to the old 'normal' any time soon.

Comparison of UK to France or Germany is better if you must compare, I agree

However, since this thread is about NZ....
I was talking to a NZer the other day, he long ago immigrated away (his NZ accent got stronger & stronger while we chatted about his youth). He said he & his family left because NZ is just so far away & "small". It takes hours to drive between places. Economic & social opportunities too limited. I'm not sure people in UK can get what it's like to live in a small island nation far from nearly all others -- UK has little in common with NZ.

I'm amazed to hear JAdhern is being villified lately by NZers -- I thought she was hugely popular, won the last (very recent) election easily, etc. It's good to hear that there are diversity of views in NZ, though, that the denizens aren't identikits after all.

Many of us have had or have currently got Covid and it's hard to be scared of something that you've experienced as a very mild illness indeed.

This, in itself, is a complacent statement. We have known since quite early in 2020 that many experience no symptoms whatsover when infected, and yet it is still a global pandemic that has killed more than five and a half million people.

For many it is little more than a cold, and for many of a similar age and seeming health level, it causes death or disability.

To simper about colds and flus as equivalents, to imply that to think otherwise is an overreaction, when every government and every health department in the world is taking active measures to suppress and fight an infectious, airborne pandemic is so.... complacent.

@shiningcuckoo

So much misinformation is out there about NZ. Most of the country has been living with relatively few Restrictions for the last two years. We are not in lockdown, many businesses seem to be doing pretty well. The restrictions around masks, gatherings, vaccination passes are straightforward and sensible if you agree with vaccination. The governments strategy is not around elimination and hasn't been for a long time. It is about achieving a controlled spread to protect our health services. And the government has been very Firm on restrictions applying to everyone There are no government lockdown parties here and of course the PM cancelled her wedding. It's not about being a martyr. It's about accountability. Furthermore, surely she can have any kind of wedding she wants - it's not like she is asking the taxpayer to pay for it.

The situation at the border is tricky. However many many cases have been picked up at the border and this stance has certainly stopped the virus flooding the country. It's hard for those awaiting a MIQ spot, but for many, they are wanting to 'come home' after a long period overseas because they are now seeing NZ as safer. It's only safer because of border controls. As for wanting to come into NZ to attend to your rental properties, well you might want to get over yourself or 'cry me a river' as MP Julie-Ann Genter said not that long ago. While our health services are vulnerable and our Māori communities suffering sub standard health outcomes, no one is going to be terribly bothered about letting in an overseas landlord to attend to their holiday lets.

What is out of control is the vitriol towards the democratically elected PM. Threats to kill her or rape her. Misogynistic name calling. She has done so well to rise above it and would not receive this wild offensive hate if she were a man. She makes the opposition leaders look like graceless oafs and her verbal destruction of the smugly bigoted leader of the National Party was a joy to behold. My main problem with Jacinda is the relationship between Labour and the Greens. She doesn't pull up the Greens when they are disrespectful and dismissive of anyone who isn't like them - ie people who are not young and urban.

It does amaze me how many people are so invested in NZ failing to survive the pandemic with any kind of success, to the point it makes the news in the UK media. Good old colonialism with Mother England not being able to bear things being done differently and daring to restrict movement into NZ.

I hate to break the news to you, but for most of the rest of the world New Zealand is an irrelevance.

Some of us have family and friends and history there: some of us love to visit. We know, having been there and having strong contacts there, that Kiwi pride is all about being better, more civic-minded, more kind, more self-sufficient than anywhere else in the universe. What you may not realise is that that can make Kiwis, in their very white, underpopulated, very apparently civilised country, seem ever-so-slightly self-righteous to the rest of the world.

The UK handled parts of the pandemic (particularly 2020) terribly.
New Zealand handled it very well.

Both of those are correct - you cannot compared like for like with them due to numerous differences in cultural/economic/geographical and social factors but the statements are correct.

But this is a different point surely - the exit strategy out of the pandemic into a world where however much we dont want it to be Covid is here and here to stay.

Different countries are doing this within certain parameters - borders open, vaccine passports, mask use and testing. Again the UK is perhaps an anomaly in how much it completely getting rid of these but that is a separate discussion as to whether it has gone too far.

New Zealand to me is still in the controlling the wave before its exit strategy and its borders I think may well remain closed beyond February because looking at Australia there is definitely a price to pay to do so. And then there is the factor of how much Omicron is milder because of the number of reinfections and it is hitting for the most part a population that is used to Covid. And I imagine that unknown as well is driving the isolation period.

Hong Kong and China though are much more for a zero covid approach

@shiningcuckoo "Good old colonialism with Mother England not being able to bear things being done differently and daring to restrict movement into NZ" - it could be that though I suspect many of the anti-Kiwi posters would have lauded Sweden's no lockdown approach when it started - It might equally be deciding on a position first then looking for examples and evidence that agree with that position to promote and evidence and examples that disagree with their position to attack. Seems an anti-scientific and anti-economic way of approaching the world to me.

What’s the mood like in Aus?

It's really hard to take the temperature of the whole country, especially when every state has its own rules and status currently. Where I am, we are back in masks in supermarkets, and various other rules. There is no toilet paper in my local supermarket, for the last 3 plus weeks - which to me points to a level of quiet panic or at least unease. We have a severe shortage or RATs, people are racing around trying to find them and paying huge prices for them. It's a mess.

Seriously feel that people like Arden should be in jail for the human rights abuses of people who can't see their family/ travel home. It's appalling that this woman continues this in the face of a successful vaccine and a milder virus. No point fearing dying if you can't live. Such extreme measure are only necessary (in their view) because she opted for 0 Covid for so long that the floodgates will be opened case wise as soon as people from abroad are let in. They can't back down.

This, in itself, is a complacent statement.

What you see as complacency, I think increasingly people are seeing as realism.

Covid isn't going anywhere, it's getting more infectious rather than less. It can't be contained without severe restrictions or full border closures and these things carry enormous costs and are not sustainable long term.

Thankfully we now have vaccines, boosters, anti virals and better treatments. There comes a tipping point where the costs of suppression outweigh the benefits.

So yes, people will get covid and that's the reality of the world we live in now. But getting covid now is not the same experience as getting covid in March 2020.

Personally, I wouldn't want citizenship of any country that would arbitrarily ban its own citizens from returning/visiting. Requiring a negative test and quarantine is one thing, but just not allowing them back in - that blows my mind.

I agree. Or a country that would prevent its citizens from leaving without a 'valid reason', as the UK did at one point. These aren't silly little nice-to-have privileges. Restricting citizens from leaving or entering their own country is an extreme and, I believe, illegitimate action if a country wants to call itself a democracy. I don't understand why so many people see it is as trivial, even if they themselves don't want to travel internationally (and like you, I'm not talking about quarantines and tests etc.).