Covid-19 Delta outbreak one year on: A year of lockdowns, infamy, vax-a-thons and a whole lot of cases

Exactly one year ago today, New Zealand was plunged into another lockdown following a community case of the Delta strain of Covid-19 on Auckland's North Shore.

The first case was a 58-year-old tradie, who had travelled from his North Shore home to the Coromandel Peninsula while infected. More cases soon appeared, with a total of five confirmed by the next morning.

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and her team wasted no time in announcing a snap lockdown the same evening as the first case which was to be effective from midnight.

The next morning, swarms of people flooded testing sites, anxious that the arms of Delta had reached them already as the locations of interest accumulated rapidly.

Supermarkets, nightclubs, bakeries, and petrol stations were just some of the many locations.

In the centre of all of this was Kelvin and Sophia's family in Birkdale, who became part of a group dubbed the "Birkdale cluster".

Also, that next day, Ardern and the now familiar face of Dr Ashley Bloomfield, the director-general of health, addressed the country and shared what they knew and predicted.

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern at a Pacific youth-led vaccination event held at Fale o Samoa in Mangere during the Delta outbreak. Photo / File

Officials said they expected to see "120 cases" of the delta strain in New Zealand, a number that now pales in comparison to the daily figures after the Omicron outbreak this year. They also announced that mask use would be mandatory in public areas for all those over 12 for the foreseeable future.

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For the Birkdale family, it had all started with a Sunday gathering on August 15.

Their two daughters and two friends were at the family home on Auckland's North Shore for a little celebration.

Less than 48 hours later their worlds were turned upside down.

A flatmate of their two daughters, and one of their partners, was an employee of a Devonport tradesman - Case A and New Zealand's first in the community for six months.

This core group, which was announced to the nation following the plunge into lockdown, was taken immediately to the Jet Park facility, used as a quarantine centre for positive cases. Kelvin, Sophia, and Marion who had her regular Monday visit from her granddaughters, urgently sought their own tests.

Sophia and Marion soon discovered they were both positive, but Kelvin's first test came back negative. Two days later he too returned a positive result and joined his wife at Jet Park.

Jet Park Hotel quarantine facility in Māngere, Auckland. Photo / Sylvie Whinray

Now, a year on, Sophia shared her family's experience with both Covid and infamy.

Mum Sophia said every member of the family has experienced long-Covid symptoms. Dad Kelvin had to see a respiratory specialist for his lungs for the months following the illness.

"He had to be careful that he didn't pick up any infection because of the damage Covid had caused," Sophia said.

All other members of the family, including the grandmother who was a part of the original cluster, said their main long-Covid symptoms have been mainly fatigue and shortness of breath, a now familiar story for many New Zealanders.

One of the daughters, a nurse, is the only member of the family to contract Covid a second time and had also suffered from pneumonia since then.

Not only has she felt the full effect of the illness but other aspects too.

At the hospital where she works, she will often be only one of two nurses left to cover her entire ward for the shift due to the heath system's staffing issues - which have been exacerbated by the pandemic.

Special messaging projected up the shaft of the Sky Tower to celebrate the double jab rate hitting 80 per cent in November. Photo / Chris Tarpey

Regarding her Covid infamy, Sophia said she was glad their identity stayed hidden at the time.

"Sometimes I ask people if they remember the cluster and reveal my identity then, most people in the community know us because of that.

"My family still makes jokes that we are famous."

The next major event was the division of the country, with officials keeping Northland and most of Auckland in level 4 and sending the rest of the Covid-light regions into level 3 on August 31.

Vaccination rates became the topic of conversation next, and October 16th's vax-a-thon was the climax of the Government's effort to get the country double-jabbed by the summer.

Ninety became the magic number, that's the percentage of people officials wanted to see doubled jabbed by the warmer months.

Residents in Auckland celebrate the relaxed restrictions under the new Covid framework at the start of December. Photo / Alex Burton

Nationally, 130,002 vaccine doses were administered that day, a one-day record, in "Super Saturday" vaccination events across the country.

It allowed the Government to introduce the new Covid-19 Protection Framework (the traffic light system based on the vaccine pass) which came into effect at 11.59 pm on December 2.

The new framework gave way for more gatherings, and on January 23, the first case of community Omicron was announced, which then turned to 59 cases of the strain only three days later.

The following weeks became known as the peak and crest of the first wave in the second outbreak as cases started climbing rapidly.

Large daily case totals soon became our new normal, as we learned to live with Covid-19.