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Large parts of New Zealand will move out of lockdown as the number of COVID-19 cases in the country continues to fall, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern announced on Monday.
New Zealand reported 20 new cases of community transmitted COVID-19 on Monday, taking a cluster discovered in Auckland to 821 in total.
The country was put in a hard lockdown within hours of a single case being detected on Aug. 18, with all schools and non-essential businesses closed.
Ardern said most of the country would see restrictions eased from Wednesday.
“This is testament to everybody’s hard work,’’ she said.
However, there are new rules the country must follow, including mandatory mask wearing indoors, and limits on gatherings of 50 people indoors and up to 100 outdoors.
“Delta has changed the game so in order to beat it, we have to change our game plan too.
“We have done so well to get this outbreak under control, we are in sight of elimination but we cannot drop the ball,’’ Ardern said.
The Auckland region, the epicentre of the outbreak, would remain under strict lockdown, with the city’s restrictions due to be reviewed on Sept. 13.
It was the first nationwide lockdown in New Zealand since March 2020, where the entire country was at the highest level of restrictions for six weeks.
“The country, with a population of five million, has reported about 3,400 cases of COVID-19 since the onset of the pandemic with 27 deaths,’’ the prime minister Ardern stated. (dpa/NAN)
