Covid-19 restrictions look set to be relaxed in the coming weeks as the Omicron outbreak plateaus and the border begins to reopen.
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has signalled public health measures will only be eased once the Omicron outbreak is "well beyond" its peak and pressure on the health system is manageable. Photo: RNZ / Angus Dreaver
Cabinet is meeting today to review vaccine mandates, vaccine passports and the traffic light system, though any decisions will be announced on Wednesday.
The changes will mark the biggest domestic shake up to Covid-19 restrictions since Omicron arrived on Aotearoa's shores.
Epidemiologist professor Tony Blakely of Melbourne University said vaccine passes are among the restrictions that are now now excessive, given the spread of the outbreak.
"Many people have already been infected and the need to slow transmission down is less now and whilst the vaccines are good at stopping you going to hospital or preventing death, they're not as good at stopping any infection.
"People who were triple vaccinated three months ago have now got a 50 percent reduction in the infection risk, it's not 100 percent, so discriminating or differentiating between the vaccinated and unvaccinated when you haven't got a pressing epidemic happening at that moment in time I think is disproportionate."
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has signalled public health measures will only be eased once the Omicron outbreak is "well beyond" its peak and pressure on the health system is manageable.
Blakely said daily case numbers were "grossly underestimating" true infections in New Zealand but can still be used to interpret trends, including an outbreak's peak.
"Your hospitalisations will not yet have quite peaked but they should plateau soon and perhaps start going down in about ten days, two weeks. Those are all clear signals that the peak is passing and you've now got a long tail."
University of Canterbury Covid-19 modeller Professor Michael Plank said scrapping vaccine passes was an obvious next step in the management of the outbreak.
"As we go forward with a combination of waning immunity and an increasing proportion of the population having been infected and subsequently recovered I think the vaccine pass system starts to be less effective in terms of reducing community transmission."
Also up for review today is vaccine mandates which now cover employees working in MIQ, Corrections, education, FENZ, police and defence.
The mandates were a focal point of discontent among Parliament's protesters but the government has never committed to setting an end date for them; making this crystal clear during the three week-long occupation.
"We all want to go back to the way that life was and we will, I suspect sooner than you think, but when that happens it will be because easing restrictions won't compromise the lives of thousands of people; not because you demanded it," Jacinda Ardern said.
The tail end of the protest coincided with a landmark decision out of the High Court that found the vaccine mandates for police and defence personnel unlawful.
The judge noted the decision did not affect other mandates but the Public Service Commission has since advised government departments and agencies to pause the dismissal of staff refusing to get vaccinated to check they were relying on the latest public health advice before continuing with dismissals.
Plank said it was possible mandates for the likes of teachers, introduced before the paediatric vaccine was approved, would be scrapped but warned not all mandates will go.
"It will probably be increasingly targeted to those higher risk encounters or settings such as aged residential care and health care."
Both Plank and Blakely stressed the important roles both vaccination and restrictions have played in reducing serious illness and deaths.
They agreed none of the measures could be put away for good with the threat of new variants and possible future peaks in winter still on the horizon.
Any changes to the current restrictions will be formally announced on Wednesday.
