Late last week, New Zealand celebrated 100 days without community transmission of COVID-19 – fast-forward to this week and the country has gone into another lockdown.
Speaking of lockdowns, hear about how citizens of Melbourne are coping below:
According to multiple reports, four new cases of coronavirus have been detected in New Zealand – and the source of them remains a mystery to health authorities.
Following the confirmation of these new cases, New Zealand’s Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern announced the city of Auckland would be going back into stage three lockdown from midday August 12th.
Unfortunately, this means Auckland residents will be required to stay home other than for essential reasons like going to the supermarket or getting exercise. Non-essential employees will need to work from home and public venues including libraries, museums, cinemas, food courts, gyms, pools, playgrounds and markets will be closed.
The rest of New Zealand will go into stage two lockdown, which includes strict social distancing rules and limits on mass gatherings of 100 people.
Speaking in an address via 9News, Ardern said New Zealand had a “resurgence plan that we are now activating.”
“That plan is based on what we’ve seen from resurgence overseas,” she said. “These three days will give us time to assess the situation, gather information, make sure we have widespread contact tracing so we can find out more about how this case arose and make decisions about how to respond to it once we have further information.”
It’s no surprise the New Zealand government is quickly enforcing a new lockdown. According to ABC, the country managed to initially eliminate COVID-19 transmission on May 1st after just 65 days.
However, these new cases have sadly encouraged panic buying in Auckland, with reports that New Zealanders are mobbing local supermarkets to stock up on essential items amidst new lockdown measures.
Kudos to Jacinda Ardern and the New Zealand government for acting quickly in an attempt to control a potential outbreak. We can only hope these measures prove successful in the coming days.
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