27 Sep 2021

Covid-19 Minister on details of self-isolation pilot

From Checkpoint, 5:06 pm on 27 September 2021

Home isolation is coming, but not quite yet and it is just for a select few. The Prime Minister floated the idea of a self isolation in pilot in August saying it would begin in October.

Today Jacinda Ardern announced full details of the scheme are coming on Wednesday and expressions of interest will open from Thursday.

Covid-19 Response Minister told Checkpoint the government will accept a variety of business applicants for the self-isolation pilot, so they can see what approaches work, and what the challenges are.

“We'll be looking for a good spread... a good mix of potentially different arrangements to make sure that we’re doing what we're aiming to do here, which is to test out different options to test out different approaches, so that we can see what works, we can see what the challenges are associated with it, so that we can be in a position early next year to say these are the things that work.”

He said tracking those in self-isolation may primarily involve GPS tracking via smartphone.