New Zealand will not be moving out of the alert level four lockdown scenario early. 

Prime Minister Jacinda Arden today (Thursday April 9) confirmed the four week lockdown at alert level four will continue to its completion date of April 22.

“This is a marathon,” she said. “We will not be moving out of level four early.”.

Instead, the next two weeks will focus on “scaling up” the response to COVID-19 by clamping down on border controls, increasing testing, and improving contract tracing to break the chain of transmission, she said.

Every New Zealander returning home will be either quarantined (for those who test positive or are symptomatic) or put in assisted self-isolation for 14 days at a government paid hotel in Auckland.

Jacinda outlined the signposts for the next two weeks, advising that next week the government will announce “what life will be like” when the country eventually moves to alert level three, releasing guidelines and details on what will be expected of businesses, schools and so on. 

On April 20, two days before the current lockdown is scheduled to expire, the government will make a decision, based on the most current health advice, on whether or not to lift the lockdown.

She cautioned, however, that New Zealanders should not expect to go back to normal when the country changes to alert level three.

“When we’re in a position to move from alert level four it will only be from there to alert level three. So life will still be different.” 

We do want to ease our restrictions but if we move too quickly, and loosen up too quickly, we will be back to the beginning,” she said. “No one wants to be in alert level four longer than we need to, and that’s why we need to be so careful as we exit it.”

For example, she said, schools might resume under alert level three but there may be different situations for different learning levels, like between early childhood learning, primary and secondary schools.

From today and over the next two weeks, Jacinda said, she encourages all businesses to prepare themselves for a change, look at how they can adjust their operations to better suit alert level three requirements.

As a starting point, there are three simple things the government will be asking of businesses preparing for alert level three, she said. 

“Look at whether or not you can work with social distancing; can we contract trace all the customers or all of the employees you work with; and...will you need PPE [personal protection equipment such as masks]?”

PHOTO: RNZ