A recent cluster of new COVID-19 cases in New Zealand means that many are set to face renewed restrictions, while residents of the United Kingdom, where the omicron variant is far worse, will see restrictions rolled back later this week.
The two countries are particularly stark examples of the way in which governments are increasingly taking different approaches to the pandemic. The divergent strategies for dealing with new surges and variants indicate a willingness on many governments’ parts to treat COVID-19 as endemic and create policies that help people live with the virus rather than aim to stamp it out. Even where cases and hospitalizations remain high, including in parts of Europe, the willingness to abide by capacity limits and other social distancing rules in public is decreasing.
The U.K. and several Western European countries, such as Ireland and France, are adopting a more laissez faire approach now that a cohort of scientists believes omicron has peaked on the continent. For example, there will no longer be COVID-19-safe crowd capacity limits at sports and cultural venues in France and Ireland. Germany, meanwhile, will stick to its pandemic safety rules, including the requirement that a person shows proof of vaccination or a negative COVID-19 test to enter restaurants. Tighter restrictions for bars and restaurants were added in Germany earlier this month amid a rise in cases due to the omicron variant.
EUROPEAN COUNTRIES ROLLING BACK COVID-19 RESTRICTIONS
Starting Thursday, U.K. citizens will no longer have to wear masks or be required to show proof of vaccination to enter businesses and restaurants. The British government also announced on Monday that it would scrap COVID-19 testing requirements for fully vaccinated travelers entering the country starting on Feb. 11, just in time for a holiday break for many schoolchildren.
New Zealand, meanwhile, moved to a “red” level alert system on Sunday after government health authorities confirmed that nine members of a family from the southern Nelson-Marlborough region had tested positive for omicron. The family had recently traveled for a wedding in Auckland, New Zealand’s most populous city, where they are expected to have interacted with roughly 100 people.
“Our plan for managing omicron cases in the early stage remains the same as delta, where we will rapidly test, contact trace, and isolate cases and contacts in order to slow the spread,” Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said on Sunday.
Ardern, who had to postpone her own wedding due to the new variant, insisted that the heightened threat level would not cause societywide lockdowns that have been used in fits and starts over the past two years.
“Businesses stay open, and you can do most of the things that you normally do, including visiting family and friends and traveling around the country,” she said on Sunday.
The move to a “red” threat level means mandatory mask-wearing in public. Schools will remain open, but children will have to wear masks in class. Sporting venues and other events such as funerals and weddings will have a max capacity of 100 people, all of whom must be vaccinated. New Zealanders who have not gotten the shots face more stringent restrictions. Unlike their vaccinated counterparts, they cannot go to hairdressers or gyms, attend events such as concerts, or dine in cafes and restaurants.
Ardern’s hawkish stance on COVID-19 lockdowns, the country’s vaccine passport system, and high vaccination rates have led to a small pandemic toll for New Zealand. Cases plummeted at the tail-end of November and into December but have ticked up in recent weeks due to the increased spread of omicron.
New Zealand, a country of 5 million, had been held up as one of the few countries to have successfully contained COVID-19 thanks to closing borders to most international travel and placing cities under strict lockdowns. For much of the pandemic, Ardern had been pursuing a zero-COVID-19 strategy that would see the virus eliminated in New Zealand, but the onslaught of the delta variant last year forced the government to abandon this strategy and move to treating the coronavirus as an endemic problem. When the first cases of delta were confirmed in New Zealand last August, Ardern quickly moved the entire country into lockdown. Auckland remained in lockdown for roughly 90 days.
At its zenith in November, the delta wave in New Zealand caused about 195 new infections in a single day. The country has recorded about 68 new cases a day on average over the past week, according to the University of Oxford-maintained Our World in Data. In total, the country has confirmed about 15,600 cases and 52 deaths due to COVID-19. Despite the recent uptick in cases, a vast majority of diagnostic tests performed in New Zealand are coming back negative.
Neighboring Australia, meanwhile, where the disease burden is considerably higher, is forging ahead with reopening plans. After tight lockdowns and border closures helped keep cases down through much of the pandemic, Prime Minister Scott Morrison has pivoted recently to adopt a policy of living with the virus and dealing with surges as they arise.
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In the U.K., over 93,000 new cases were reported daily over the past week. The omicron variant has caused the sharpest jumps in new infections ever recorded during the pandemic, peaking on Jan. 5 with about 183,000 new cases. The previous record for the highest daily case increase was set during the delta wave on Jan. 8, 2021, with nearly 60,000 new infections.
