New Zealand has moved today to a slightly less-restrictive way of living with Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern declaring the coronavirus "currently eliminated" - and the country's efforts now the focus of international attention.
The country moved to level 3 at 11.59pm on Monday, easing some of the restrictions of the level-4 living of the past four-and-a-half weeks - including another 400,000 Kiwis returning to work and the lifting of fast-food restrictions. People were already lining up at McDonald's drive-thrus early on Tuesday.
New Zealand's main centres are buzzing for the first time in almost five weeks. Timesaver Traffic's Rebecca Apolosi says it's clearly visible on Auckland roads.
"Overlooking Spaghetti Junction, I can see plenty of cars coming and going in all directions. The Southern Motorway is the most active, heading south. There's the usual trucks, buses and courier vehicles that have been operating as normal under alert level 4.
"However, there's plenty of tradie vans and utes whizzing past as well this morning."
With just 270 active Covid cases in the country, New Zealand is now the focus of headlines in the UK, USA and Australia.
The Daily Telegraph in the UK reported New Zealand being on the verge of a "brilliant victory" and Australia's mass-market news.com website said New Zealand had won a major battle. The New York Times and Washington Post have both featured articles on how New Zealand is combating the threat.
But Ardern warned Kiwis they needed to do everything they could to prevent a second wave of infection. "We must make sure that we do not let the virus run away on us again and cause a new wave of cases and deaths."
To do this, Ardern said New Zealanders must "hunt down the last few cases of the virus".
Ardern appeared on the Mike Hosking Breakfast show on Newstalk ZB this morning, seven hours after we moved into level 3, to speak on a range of subjects - including the wage subsidy scheme and the impact on businesses.
Ardern said she had "looked out for the welfare" of Labour MP Deborah Russell following the MP's controversial comments about businesses last week.
"My job is to make sure she knows she's done something wrong and when she does, she is supported. I don't think it's mutually exclusive to be concerned about the welfare of someone in my team.
"Of course, she knows she did something wrong."
Bay of Plenty fisherman Sean Bracefield casts into the sunrise this morning. Fisherman were back into it long before the sun came up on Papamoa Beach today. Photo / Alan Gibson
Russell last week backtracked on her comments regarding small businesses' own responsibility for being in trouble in the pandemic.
Russell made headlines when she said: "We are seeing a number of small businesses really struggling, after only a few weeks in a pretty bad situation, which must speak to the strength of those small businesses going into this lockdown."
After a public backlash, Russell apologised and acknowledged her comments were hurtful.
Ardern said Russell knew she had done wrong, and the Prime Miniter herself had said so publicly.
When asked by Hosking if we were still being too conservative, Ardern said: "We are doing what's right for New Zealand".
"I have a lot of faith in New Zealanders.
"I was speaking to someone in politics in Australia, and they were saying they would have been better off shutting retail. They would have looked after their workers better in shutting."
Ardern said the Government's goal was to keep people in work and "I think we have largely done that".
Ardern yesterday urged people to remain vigilant as the restrictions eased.
Yesterday was the ninth day in a row where the number of new cases was in single digits.
There were just five new cases yesterday, taking the total number to 1469.
With 1180 recoveries so far, that means there are just 270 active cases across the country.
In other words, 80 per cent of all confirmed and probable cases have recovered.
"I would say we have achieved, through alert level 4, the position we wanted to be in so that we could now start to move down alert levels," Director-General of Health Dr Ashley Bloomfield said yesterday.
Ardern was equally as optimistic.
"It's been nearly five weeks living and working in ways that just two months ago would have seemed like fiction," she told media.
By contrast, elimination means the reduction of new Covid-19 cases to either zero, or a very low defined rate.
Asked if New Zealand had eliminated Covid-19, Ardern replied it "currently" had.
But she pointed out that the next challenge for the Government was Covid-19's tail.
"Elimination means we may well reach zero, but we may well then have small numbers of cases coming up again," she told media this afternoon.
"That doesn't mean we have failed, it just means that we're in the position to have that zero-tolerance approach to have very aggressive management of those cases and keep those numbers low."
As the Government does its part, Ardern called on New Zealanders the "team of five million" – to do theirs.
"Record where you have been, who you've been with and that will make all our jobs easier."
But the optimism of the continued number of new cases was tinged in some sadness yesterday, as Bloomfield revealed another Covid-19-related death – a woman in her 90s.
She was part of the St Margaret's Hospital cluster in Auckland and is the 19th person to die from Covid-19 in New Zealand.
