‘A lot of people are going to get Covid’ – Hipkins

‘Keeping Covid out of the country was never a five-year strategy.’

THE coronavirus will eventually become ‘‘endemic’’ in New Zealand, and there may be ‘‘significant’’ changes to the borders in the first half of this year, Covid-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins says.

The sheer infectiousness of the Omicron variant has prompted many epidemiologists overseas to suggest endemic Covid is unavoidable. Endemic does not mean harmless, it is more akin to Covid being somewhat predictable and manageable, much like other respiratory illnesses like the flu.

New Zealand successfully kept Covid out until August last year before a Delta outbreak forced a rethink in strategy. Since then, the virus has been well suppressed.

‘‘Keeping Covid out of the country was never a five-year strategy. It was always an immediate strategy to get us to the point where we can be vaccinated, and we can be better prepared,’’ Hipkins told Sunday News. ‘‘Now we have to accept we are coming to the next phase of the strategy where we will have Covid – hopefully eventually endemic in the community rather than pandemic and will have systems in place that will support that.’’

Some world leaders in highly vaccinated countries have already spoken of treating Covid19 like other respiratory diseases such as the flu or RSV. ‘‘We will absolutely get to that point,’’ Hipkins said.

But to get there, New Zealand will have to endure a significant number of Omicron cases, he said. Such an approach is only possible because of New Zealand’s high vaccination rates. That said, and even though Omicron is seemingly much less severe than Delta, Hipkins said the sheer number of expected cases would put still pressure on the health system.

There was at least one ‘‘pressure point’’ (or Omicron wave) to get past, which is something New Zealanders would need to ‘‘psychologically prepare for’’.

New South Wales (NSW) Health Minister Brad Hazzard was criticised when he said everyone ‘‘is probably going to get Omicron at some stage’’. So will the same apply here?

‘‘I think a lot of people are certainly going to get Covid.

Even people who have been fully vaccinated . . . but we know that if they’re fully vaccinated, and they’ve been boosted, then for the significant majority of those it will be something they will just get through.’’

The Government has postponed a planned room release for MIQ (managed isolation and quarantine) rooms in March and April, prompting many to ask what the future of the border looks like.

Regarding the border, Hipkins said: ‘‘I think you’ll start to see significant movements in the first half of the year.’’

The strategy, he said, would be underpinned by a desire to keep infectious people – including those arriving from overseas – out of the community to avoid seeding cases and explosive outbreaks.

The country would still move to a ‘‘self-isolation’’ model – where instead of MIQ, people are asked to stay at home to be sure they’re not infectious. ‘‘We will be saying to people, yes come in, please go straight home, stay at home for a period of time until you’re confident you don’t have Covid, or if you’re coming in with it, that you’ve recovered from it.’’

An Omicron outbreak could force the Government’s hand on the border: ‘‘If Covid-19 spreads rapidly through the community that makes a lot of decisions for us.

‘‘On the other hand, the position that we’re in at the moment, where we don’t have Omicron spreading in the community, we’re aware that once we move to a self-isolation model, that will change quite quickly (and the virus will spread) . . . It’s one of those things where you only get to make that decision once.’’

No call had been made at this point, but Cabinet has accepted the decision cannot be put off forever, Hipkins said. ‘‘We can’t . . . pursue a ‘keep it out strategy’ indefinitely. We just know that that’s not going to be sustainable.’’