New Zealand closed its largest city on Sunday, after only one family tested positive for COVID-19.
The Prime Minister, Jacinda Ardern, ordered the three-day closure in Auckland after a couple and their daughter tested positive in the nation, considering that they virtually eliminated the spread of the contagion.
There are only four new community cases in the last three months, with the first closing in New Zealand in six months.
“We have already wiped out the virus and we will do it again,” Ardern said at a news conference in the capital, Wellington.
Level 3 restrictions require everyone to stay home except basic shopping and essential jobs. It will also force a delay in the America’s Cup sailing regatta.
“Three days should give us enough time to gather more information, do large-scale testing, and establish whether there has been a wider community transmission,” Ardern said. “That’s what we believe requires a prudent approach and that’s the right thing to do.”
Airlines were alerted because the woman in the infected family works for an airline catering company, LSG Sky Chefs, where she works primarily in laundries, officials said. He had not boarded planes.
His unidentified family was the first confirmed infection since a traveler returning from Europe tested positive on January 24, which was the first case in two months.
New Zealand, with a population of 5 million, has reported a total of just over 2,330 cases and 25 deaths since the pandemic began.
Scientists are conducting genome sequencing to see if they are variants, and also to see if they match any infected passenger, said COVID-19 response minister Chris Hipkins.
“New Zealand has maintained the content of COVID-19 better than almost any other country,” Hipkins said of the nation that closed its international borders and introduced strict social distancing at the start of the pandemic.
“But, as we said, there’s no risk.”
With publishing cables