Traffic light to stop virus in New Zealand

In early December, New Zealand will end the three-and-a-half-month lockdown in Auckland, the country’s largest city, by adopting a new strategy to combat the coronavirus. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said that from 11:59pm on December 2, New Zealand will adopt a new response to Covid-19 aimed at containing the delta variant rather than trying to eradicate it entirely.

How does the traffic light system work in New Zealand

The new system provides for the adoption of a kind of “traffic light”: with no green control of viruses, orange requires the use of a mask in certain places, while red allows activities to remain open only to vaccinated customers and observe social distancing.

“The hard truth is that delta is here and it’s not going away,” he told reporters. “While no country has been able to completely eradicate the delta variant, New Zealand is in a better position than most to deal with it.” So far, the New Zealand government has been aiming for a complete eradication of the virus, the so-called “zero covid” policy, with strict containment measures, strict contact tracing, and strict border controls.

The disease has killed just 40 of the five million people, but public pressure has increased to end the lockdown on Auckland since the discovery of the delta variant in August. Ardern had originally planned to change policy once the 90% vaccination rate in the country was reached, but eventually expected to reopen with a vaccination level of about 83%.