Covid-19 Omicron outbreak: Chris Hipkins tests positive as major border announcement looms

Covid Response Minister Chris Hipkins has been struck down by the virus.

Hipkins posted a photo of his positive test result on Twitter this morning, saying: “The faint line seems out of keeping with how I currently feel!”

Hipkins had already been isolating for a week after one of his children tested positive and will now be stuck at home for another seven days.

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern is set to unveil the much-anticipated border reopening with tourism chiefs hoping this will reinvigorate an industry all but killed from Covid lockdowns.

In just a matter of weeks, fully vaccinated tourists from across the ditch should be walking through international airport terminals and straight into tourist hotspots, and the stricken tourism industry hopes it will happen before Easter and the April school holidays.

Despite recording the highest hospitalisation rates during the outbreak, early indications suggest New Zealand could reopen to the world by Easter to capture the lucrative Aussie school holiday market before welcoming tourists in for the ski season.

At 11.30am, the Government is set to announce the new earlier date for when tourists can come back to explore the country after a two-year hiatus. Australians are expected to be given the first privilege before reopening to the rest of the world.

Tourism Industry Aotearoa communications manager Ann-Marie Johnson said the best hope would be able to welcome Australians back for the April school holidays which fell over Easter and the upcoming ski season.

She told AM there would be a “trickle at the start” and she didn’t expect to see any significant visitors from the rest of the world until next summer, but the announcement would at least allow people to be able to start making plans now.

Some operators may not reopen or may have lost some employees to other industries, but she hoped they would also see the new opportunities awaiting.

Actual Covid-19 cases numbers expected to be double

Yesterday there were 21,616 Covid cases in the community and a record 960 patients in hospital battling the virus. Two more people also died with the virus.

But the actual case numbers could be much higher as health officials believe testing is only picking up half of the total positive Covid-19 cases in Auckland and Northland.

New Omicron subvariant dominant in New Zealand

Otago University virologist Dr Jemma Geoghegan said the Covid-19 Omicron subvariant BA.2 had taken over from BA.1 as the dominant variant in New Zealand.

Geoghegan said the emergence of BA.2 might prolong the Omicron surge, but was unlikely to result in a large second wave given it was already in New Zealand.

“What we’ve seen overseas is the Omicron surges are generally quite short and sharp so we are in the best possible scenario where we are highly vaccinated, highly boosted and in the tail end of summer coming into autumn. So hopefully we do have time before those other new infections start circulating in the community again before the borders open.”

She told RNZ it was impossible to know the exact proportions of the BA.1 and BA.2 variants circulating because mostpeople are now using home tests, but data suggested there was no difference in disease severity and vaccines and boosters provided good protection against both.

Impact of long Covid-19 here for years to come

Victoria University epidemiologist Mona Jeffreys warned the burden of long covid after the Omicron outbreak is going to be huge for the months and years to come.

Speaking with Newstalk ZB’s Mike Hosking, Jeffreys said there were concerns about it affecting people who had just mild symptoms of Covid-19 as well as those whose symptoms were severe.

“At the moment there is no evidence to show that the worst you have Covid the more likely you are to have long Covid so that’s why we’re really concerned.”

It was also unknown whether age or underlying conditions were a contributing factor to long Covid and Jeffreys said that would be determined as part of new research.

She encouraged New Zealanders who had the virus before December last year to take part.

“The more people we have, the better the evidence we’ll get to answer exactly those questions.”

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