There are 19 new cases of Covid-19 in New Zealand. A fifth person has died, the third from a cluster of cases at a rest home in Christchurch.
New Zealand's declining Covid-19 rates have been tinged with the sadness of a fifth death, as British Prime Minister Boris Johnson credits an Invercargill-born nurse for saving his life. Get all the important news and read the full stories in the links below.
Key developments in NZ
• New Zealand's declining Covid-19 rates have been tinged with the sadness of news of a fifth death. The fifth person to die is a man in his 80s - the third death from a cluster at the Rosewood rest home in Linwood, Christchurch. The man had been moved from Rosewood to nearby Burwood Hospital, where it was announced today a staff member had also contracted Covid-19. A further 19 cases have been reported in the past 24 hours but almost four times that many people - 75 - have been reported as recovered in the same period. It means the number of active cases has fallen from 855 to 798. The 19 new cases announced today are made up of 15 confirmed and four probable cases. There are 15 people in hospital, with four in intensive care. One is in a critical condition in Dunedin.
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and Director-General of Health Dr Ashley Bloomfield during their media update. Photo / Mark Mitchell
• The Government will give much-awaited detail this Thursday on how and which businesses will be allowed to reopen if and when the national lockdown is lifted on April 22. While the country spent barely two days at alert level 3 before going to full lockdown on March 25, ministers have been thrashing out details in anticipation of an announcement on April 20 that the country will start moving out of lockdown in the latter half of next week. Thursday's announcements are intended to give far more detail about life at alert levels 3 and 2 and will follow announcements on Tuesday and Wednesday which will include economic scenarios and new measures to assist businesses hit by the lockdown.
• With all efforts focused on containing the coronavirus, a second epidemic is flourishing - domestic violence. Kirsty Johnston reports.
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Around the world
• The Invercargill-born nurse credited by British Prime Minister Boris Johnson for saving his life after he was struck down with Covid-19 is "overwhelmed" by the international response. Last night Johnson, who has been in hospital for a week being treated for Covid-19, thanked the National Health Service and its staff - but singled out two nurses who stood by his bedside for 48 hours "when things could have gone either way". He said Jenny from New Zealand - Invercargill "to be exact" - and Luis from Portugal were the reason that "in the end, my body did start to get enough oxygen". But Jenny McGee has more important things to do than concentrate on the accolades - she's back at work helping others battling the deadly virus.
Kiwi nurse Jenny McGee, who was credited with saving Boris Johnson's life. Photo / Supplied
• It's been 100 days since the first signs of coronavirus emerged. It started as a cluster of pneumonia cases in China's Wuhan and since then has ripped across the world, changing the lives of billions. Now three months into the pandemic there have been more than 1.5 million cases of Covid-19 recorded with more than 100,000 deaths, mainly in the US, Italy, Spain, France and the UK. Here is how the crisis unfolded.
• By the time US President Donald Trump first spoke publicly about the coronavirus, it may already have been too late. On January 22, Trump played down the threat posed by the respiratory virus from China, which had just reached American shores in the form of a solitary patient in Washington state. "We have it totally under control," Trump said on CNBC. "It's one person coming in from China, and we have it under control. It's going to be just fine." In the 11 weeks since that interview, the coronavirus has infected more than 500,000 Americans and killed at least 20,000. In the ensuing month, before the president first addressed the crisis from the White House, key steps to prepare the nation for the coming pandemic were not taken.
• The New Zealand and Australian governments should start planning now for a trans-Tasman travel "bubble", even if it's months before it can safely be put into action, says Auckland International Airport chief executive Adrian Littlewood. If both countries maintain their apparent success in containing the spread of the Covid-19 virus within their own borders, the opportunity to open borders to one another would be a major boost to one another's deeply battered tourism sectors, said Littlewood. Some 54 per cent of all international travel to and from New Zealand had an Australian connection last year. Littlewood's comments coincide with Australian federal tourism minister Simon Birmingham predicting that Australia's ban on international travel will likely continue until the end of the year, but with potential to ease restrictions on travel to New Zealand.
• Boutique fund manager Black Crane Capital isn't deterred by Sky Network Television's plunging share price and soaring bond yield, building a sizeable stake on the expectation the media group will emerge as a key content aggregator. The Hong Kong-based investor has quietly built up a 5.1 per cent stake in the pay-TV operator since the end of January, spending about $17.3 million. Despite uncertainty over how Sky would cope during the coronavirus crisis without their usual live sports offerings for several months, founder Peter Kennan said Sky has good form in generating solid margins from content. While Kennan expects the business to go through a major transformation, he anticipates satellite services will continue for quite a while.
• When Ben O'Keeffe puts his hand up, it's usually for an infringement on the rugby field. Now, it's to help New Zealand, if required, combat the Covid-19 outbreak. The test and Super Rugby referee is also a doctor specialising in eye treatment, and told Elliott Smith he has offered his services to a New Zealand health system he says is coping remarkably better than its overseas counterparts.
Check our graphic for the latest case numbers in New Zealand.
