Wellington: New Zealand may not return to having zero cases of Coronavirus in the community, the Director General of Health on Thursday, because the country continued efforts to spray the delta variant of the infectious infectious.
New Zealand eliminated Covid-19 years ago and most of the virus free, except a small number of cases in February, until the latest outbreak from the Delta variant erupted in August, pushing Prime Minister Jacinda Arderdn to order a national lock.
Auckland’s largest city is still locking with a small number of new cases reported every day.
“We may not return to zero but what is important is that we will continue to find infection and basically continue to contact traces, test and isolate people so that we stop the circulating virus in the community …
That’s the aim,” Ashley Bloomfield, Director General of Health told New Zealand radio.
Bloomfield said the goal now is to try and get an outbreak while also increasing the level of vaccination.
“Get a vaccination rate of more than 90% …
it’s really our new way where we will be able to return to the freedom we have,” he said.
Ardern heavy locking and international border closure in March 2020 helped control Covid-19, but the government now faces a question for the launch of a delayed vaccine.
After being delayed, New Zealand has increased inoculation with almost 40% from 5.1 million countries now fully vaccinated.
The authority reported 23 new Covid-19 cases on Wednesday, all in Auckland, took the total number of cases in the current outbreak to 1,080.
At the Covid-19 press conference later on that day, however, Response Minister Covid-19 Chris Hipkins said the government had not given up on the achievement of zero cases.
“We don’t give up to go back to zero.
It’s really what we stand for,” Hipkins said.