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Auckland, New Zealand:
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern prolonged a lockdown in New Zealand’s largest metropolis Friday, giving well being authorities extra time to hint and comprise a pressure of coronavirus beforehand unseen within the nation.
Ardern stated stay-at-home orders would stay in pressure throughout Auckland till August 26 in a bid to stop a thriller outbreak from changing into a fully-blown second wave.
Genomic exams indicated the most recent infections weren’t the identical pressure of coronavirus recorded in New Zealand earlier this yr.
“This suggests it’s not a case of the virus being dormant, or of burning embers in our community, it appears to be new to New Zealand,” Ardern stated.
She added that exams have been additionally unable to hyperlink the outbreak to any instances amongst quarantined travellers from abroad.
Since 4 individuals examined optimistic on Tuesday — the primary instances of neighborhood transmission in 102 days — New Zealand has now detected a cluster of 30 virus instances.
Amid hypothesis that the virus might have been introduced in by way of freight, Ardern admitted the supply of the pressure could by no means be discovered.
But she stated it was seemingly the outbreak had been detected early and expressed hope that it might nonetheless be held again.
“We don’t necessarily need to answer that question in order to contain and deal with this cluster effectively,” she stated.
Ardern praised the 1.5 million residents of New Zealand’s greatest metropolis as carrying a “heavy load” for the nation’s wellbeing.
“Lifting restrictions now and seeing a potential explosion in cases is the worst thing we would do for Auckland and the New Zealand economy,” she stated.
Health Minister Chris Hipkins stated earlier that two instances had been detected outdoors Auckland regardless of the lockdown.
But he performed down fears that the failure to ring-fence infections meant the virus was destined to unfold countrywide.
“The cases so far are connected, they are all part of one Auckland-based cluster, that’s good news,” he stated.
‘Completely unacceptable’
The prospect of latest wave of infections has rattled New Zealanders, who’ve come to treat the distant South Pacific nation as a transmission-free haven over the previous three months.
Wellington resident Barbara Pond described the state of affairs as “heartbreaking”.
“I’m so sick of hearing about COVID,” she stated.
“We worked so hard to get rid of it and now every time you turn around it’s COVID, COVID, COVID.”
National well being director-general Ashley Bloomfield acknowledged emotions have been operating excessive however urged the general public to not take out their frustrations on frontline well being staff.
“We’ve had reports of healthcare workers, who are doing their best to provide testing for people, being verbally abused and even attacked,” he stated.
“This is completely unacceptable,” he added, declining to offer additional particulars.
New Zealand is following the identical technique that helped comprise the virus after a seven-week lockdown earlier this yr — isolating optimistic instances, contact tracing and intensive testing.
Ardern stated swabs had been taken from 50,000 individuals prior to now two days.
The authorities is making testing necessary for frontline staff at ports and isolation services after stories that the majority employees at Auckland airport had by no means been checked for the virus.
Hipkins denied the federal government had didn’t safe the border — considered the realm most weak to COVID-19’s return — however conceded: “I’d have liked more tests (there) earlier.”
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV employees and is printed from a syndicated feed.)
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