New Zealand

Let's take the opportunity to learn from the ways that New Zealand has dealt with the COVID-19 pandemic.
Yesterday, New Zealand recorded zero new coronavirus cases for a second day.

Why the contribution is important

Copying the tools and techniques that the New Zealand Government have used will reduce the time taken to get the virus under control in Scotland.

by GRS on May 05, 2020 at 07:03PM

Current Rating

Average rating: 3.7
Based on: 21 votes

Comments

  • Posted by Hamsterpus May 05, 2020 at 19:08

    No. New Zealand is totally locked-down but the population now has no immunity. It will have to stay locked-down until a vaccine is available for use.

  • Posted by sl806e May 05, 2020 at 19:24

    You cannot compare New Zealand to the UK. Completely different demographics.

  • Posted by GRS May 05, 2020 at 19:26

    The statement that New Zealand is 'totally locked-down' is incorrect. Please see https://covid19.govt.nz

  • Posted by Hamsterpus May 05, 2020 at 19:46

    New Zealand allows nobody to enter from overseas unless its locals returning have who have a 2-week quarantine.

    To restart tourism they will have to relax this, and with the whole population having no immunity, the virus will take hold.

  • Posted by davemc May 05, 2020 at 20:41

    We should continue to look at the practice and experience of comparable countries such as New Zealand, Norway, Ireland and Denmark. We can learn many lessons, especially as they are slightly ahead of the curve in relation to the pandemic. But we cannot copy them - we do not have their powers - and our demographic is different in significant ways.

  • Posted by Robbie2005 May 05, 2020 at 20:47

    We can learn lessons from the excellent leadership shown by their PM.

  • Posted by ChicP May 05, 2020 at 21:55

    There are some ways in which UK and NZ could be considered comparable.
    NZ has a slightly larger land area than all of UK.
    In other ways, they are anything but.
    England has an extremely high population density.
    Scotland has around 5 million population.
    UK has about 66 million.
    UK is on the edge of a very densely populated continent.
    NZ is isolated in the “middle” of the Pacific Ocean.
    NZ has a smaller population than Scotland!
    Comparisons of Covid data and Government control measures can’t be taken at face value.

  • Posted by BiggGrumperz May 06, 2020 at 09:03

    I second ChicP's comments.

  • Posted by Colin87 May 07, 2020 at 06:48

    I agree that we should have followed the NZ approach at the start and saved many thousands of lives but it is too late now.

  • Posted by borisjlives May 07, 2020 at 11:29

    They have no immunity, but neither does 80% of the scottish community since immunity only comes from taking the risk of infection and hopefully not dying or having a life changing outcome.

    if on the other hand we did follow the example of countries with a stricter lockdown, and we did ourselves reach zero cases then a passporting system similar to what is proposed between Australia and New Zealand would become possible between all zero infection rate countries, without having to quarantine.

    Isn't it magnificent to live in a country where we are so proud of our health system (rightly) that the government didn't take the pandemic seriously (wrongly)and so enabled the spread of the virus for a month before acting, and even then only half heartedly, keeping schools open for weeks after social distancing had started. They must know that schools are hotbeds of disease transmission, surely.

    66 million people live in the UK, we are tiny compared to most of the other countries in Europe, but we have allowed the most deaths. It should be a matter of public shame that this country with it's free at point of provision health service has done worse than countries with larger populations and no free health service to speak of.

    When all this is done, I'm emigrating to one of these poorer countries, I think they'll look after me better than the UK government.
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