“I thank Mr Campbell for his contribution since the establishment of Te Whatu Ora last year.”

In a statement, Campbell said the removal from his position was “an inappropriate reaction to statements made in my private capacity”.

“I have spoken to [opposition leader] Christopher Luxon who has accepted my apology for any personal offence my statements may have caused. He accepted my apology.

“I have also apologised to Minister Verrall for any difficulty which my statements may have caused for her and the government.”

Campbell defends actions
Speaking to RNZ Checkpoint, Campbell continued to defend his actions.

“I’ve received a letter from the minister which responded to a letter from my lawyers, indicating that she has removed me from that position as chair of Te Whatu Ora. I think that’s a mistake and an overreaction to the statements I made in a private capacity but nevertheless that’s what she’s done,” he said.

“I think I’m entitled to make comments as a private citizen, which I did in the LinkedIn post.

“And secondly, the suggestion is that I’ve somehow got offside with the opposition, which given that I spoke to Christopher Luxon earlier today, we discussed the issues. I made an apology to him for any personal offence he had taken, he accepted that apology. We had a very nice discussion about it.

“So I don’t believe there’s any issue there. I’ve seen Richard Prebble from the ACT Party saying that he believes I have the right to make statements of this kind.”

He said the comments that he made were on a public forum, but he made them in a private capacity.

“I didn’t make those statements as chair of Te Whatu Ora … I always have to have regard to the interests of Te Whatu Ora and I don’t see anything in the statements I’ve made which was in any way damaging to Te Whatu Ora.”

Strong commitment to kaupapa
“The comments showed my political position, but there is nothing in the code of conduct which suggests you should not do that,” he said.

Campbell said emphasised his strong commitment to the kaupapa of the Pae Ora legislation and the work which Te Whatu Ora and Te Aka Whai Ora were doing to implement that legislation.

“I have devoted huge energy and time and involvement to that end. I am disappointed that I will not be working directly with the thousands of health sector staff, patients and whānau with whom I have been actively engaged. My support for them is undiminished.

“The principle of working in Tiriti partnership to achieve equity in the lives of all New Zealanders is core to my beliefs and I make no apology for that.”

Campbell would not rule out taking legal action over the matter saying it was one possible line of action.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

All mask wearing requirements in Aotearoa New Zealand — except in healthcare and aged care — will be scrapped, and household contacts will no longer need to isolate, the government confirmed today.

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and Minister for Covid-19 Response Dr Ayesha Verrall confirmed cabinet’s decision to scrap the Covid-19 Protection Framework — known as the “traffic light” system — and the majority of related public health restrictions.

The traffic light system will end tonight at 11.59pm.

Today’s media briefing.    Video: RNZ News

They said the changes would include:

• Mask-wearing only required in healthcare and aged care: including hospitals, pharmacies, primary care, aged residential and disability-related residential care
• People who test positive for covid-19 must still isolate for seven days, but household contacts no longer required to provided they take a RAT test every day
• All government vaccine mandates to end on 26 September 26
• Removal of all vaccine requirements for incoming travellers and air crew
• Leave support payments to continue
• All New Zealanders over age 65, and Māori over age 50, to get automatic access to covid-19 antiviral drugs if they test positive for Covid-19
• From Tuesday, case and hospitalisation number reporting becomes weekly, not daily

Ardern said it marked a milestone in New Zealand’s response to the virus.

She said people may still be asked to wear a mask in some places but it would be at the discretion of those managing the location, not a government requirement. Vaccination requirements would also be at the discretion of employers.

‘Claim back certainty’
“Cabinet has determined that based on public health advice we are able to remove the traffic light system and with that decision claim back the certainty we have all lost over the last three years,” she said.

“For the first time in two years we can approach summer with the much needed certainty New Zealanders and business need, helping to drive greater economic activity critical to our economic recovery.

She said there was no question the actions of New Zealanders had saved thousands of lives, but the risks were changing.

“When we moved into our first lockdown the objective was simple: To save lives and livelihoods,” Ardern said.

“I’m sure there will be many who over the years will pore over the details of every nation’s response including ours. They’ll certainly measure the outcomes in different ways but when you look at countries of our size and compare them, they’ll find the tragic loss for instance of 15,500 people in Scotland and less than 2000 in New Zealand.

“The most recent health advice now tells us that with the lowest cases and hospitalisations since February, our population well vaccinated, and expanded access to anti-viral medicines, New Zealand is in a position to move forward.”

New Zealand could move on with confidence that its actions had successfully managed cases down, she said.

‘Never to be taken alone’
“This pandemic was never one to be taken on alone, and it never was. And so today I say again to everyone from the bottom of my heart, thank you.

“I know there will be those concerned by the changes made today. I can assure you that we would not make them if we did not believe we were ready but we also need to remember that not everybody experiences covid or its risk — including to our disability community — in the same way.

“That’s why isolating covid cases to protect our most vulnerable is important, and why treatment is too.”

She said she hoped it would be the first summer where the “covid-19 anxiety can start to heal”.

“As a nation, covid has hurt us in many ways but perhaps the one we talk about less than others is the toll it’s taken on everyone’s mental health. I see that toll — I see it in my colleagues, in my community in Tāmaki Makaurau, and especially I see it in our kids.

“I don’t want people’s wellbeing to be the price of covid, but it is going to take a concerted effort from us as government and others for that not to be the case.”

Ardern said one of the byproducts of the pandemic had been that New Zealand now have some of the most advanced mental health tools in the world, and the government had taken a number of steps to improve mental wellbeing support.

Two apps a highlight
This included two apps she highlighted for anyone who may need them: Groove and Habits.

Ardern finished her statement with a line from when New Zealand first went into lockdown: “‘For the next wee while, things will look worse before they look better’. It turned out to be true, things did get worse, things did get hard, but it’s also true that finally they will and can be better”.

Ardern said looking back, decisions were often being made with imperfect information but the decisions were made with the best intentions and she stood by it.

She said the government had been open to the idea of an independent inquiry into the response but was still getting advice about what that would look like.

“We do want to learn from this period and I think you’ll see that we’ve been taking that approach all the way through.”

Asked if it was the end of the covid response, Ardern said she hoped the change would give people huge confidence and optimism.

“We are moving on because this pandemic has moved on.”

The traffic light system used things like gathering limits but that was no longer fit for purpose, she said.

“We don’t need those extraordinary measures, so we won’t use them.”

Right time to remove ‘traffic lights’
Dr Verrall said New Zealand had succeeded in avoiding the devastation caused by the pandemic overseas, and now was the right time to remove the traffic light framework and begin a new approach to managing the virus.

“Together we have got through this with one of the lowest cumulative mortality rates in the world.”

She announced another 40,000 courses of antiviral medication had also been purchased and would be freely available to older New Zealanders.

“Anyone over the age of 65, and Māori and Pacific people over the age of 50, or anyone who meets Pharmac requirements, can access the treatment in the early stages of contracting the virus,” she said.

“This means more than double the number of New Zealanders will be able to access these medicines if they need them than previously.

She acknowledged that lessening the restrictions caused concern to disabled and immune-compromised people.

“I want to reassure those Kiwis that we are making these changes because risks are lower, in fact cases are more than 10 times lower than what they were earlier in the year and we now have layers of protections in place.”

She said the support was not ending and hoped that removing the remaining vaccine mandates would ease the staffing pressures disability services have been under.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

A prominent New Zealand epidemiologist is calling for much wider mask mandates, saying the roll-out of free masks, while positive, will make a “fairly small” difference to the covid-19 outbreak.

The government yesterday announced masks and rapid antigen tests would be made freely available while the country battled a resurgence of covid-19 and other winter illnesses.

University of Otago’s Professor Michael Baker told RNZ News much more was required to prevent the worst outcomes of a “really grim winter”.

“We are missing the fundamental measure to stop sharing this virus widely and that is universal mask use indoors.”

23 more deaths
The Ministry of Health reports there were 11,382 new community cases of covid-19 yesterday and a further 23 deaths with the virus.

In a statement, the ministry said a child less than 10 years old had died, while five other people who died were in their 70s, nine were in their 80s and eight were aged over 90. Of these people, 11 were women and 12 were men.

All the deaths being reported occurred in the past seven days, the ministry said.

That takes the total number of publicly reported deaths with covid-19 to 1760 and the seven-day rolling average of reported deaths is 20.

Dr Baker said New Zealand needed to shift to becoming a “mask-using society”, which he believed could be achieved only through mandating their use in most indoor environments.

“The very ad hoc approach to requiring mask use is eroding the social licence for them,” Dr Baker said.

“You go to one social event, and everyone’s wearing a mask, and so you feel comfortable. Next day, you go to a different one, and no one’s wearing a mask, except you, and that feels a bit odd. We need to get rid of those inconsistencies.”

Fear of political backlash
Dr Baker said he believed the government had opted for a greater focus on personal responsibility for fear of a potential political backlash.

“Unfortunately, we’ve politicised this issue too much and politics is starting to take over from the science.”

But, speaking to RNZ Checkpoint, Covid-19 Response Minister Ayesha Verrall said it was “not simple” to implement mask mandates.

“It impacts the running of many businesses and we need people to take a pragmatic approach to this.”

Dr Verrall said, however, she would encourage everyone to wear a mask while indoors as much as possible.

She rejected the suggestion the government’s approach to tackling rising covid-19 cases was based on politics over health.

Dr Verrall would not say if the predicted peak of 1200 hospitalisations a day would be a crisis, but said the government was doing everything it could to avoid the scenario playing out.

‘Real health pressures’
“I think it’s really important we respond to the very real pressures in our health system, and I’ve been in close contact with healthcare workers, as well as following the statistics we get to make sure we know what the facts are, and that we respond to them and fix the problems that exist,” she said.

“A lot of what we set out today is designed to do that.”

Green Party MP Teanau Tuiono said the development was “about time”, but he would have liked to see masks made mandatory in schools.

“We’re all over it, we’re all tired… but it’s just no excuse to drop the ball because here’s the thing: there are people still in hospital, people dying from covid,” he said.

“The numbers are going up and we are in the middle of winter, so what we need here is that leadership.”

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz