Travellers from China to Australia will be required to have a negative pre-departure covid-19 test from January 5 — and New Zealand says it is now assessing the health risks.

China has seen skyrocketing covid case numbers, and a range of other countries including the United Kingdom, the United States and France have also imposed testing requirements.

NZ government duty minister Stuart Nash said tonight that New Zealand was currently assessing the situation.

“I’ve been informed today that Australia has announced pre-departure testing for travellers arriving from China. This measure is being taken in response to the rapidly unfolding situation in China,” he said.

“New Zealand has a public health risk assessment under way which will be completed in the next 24 hours.

“Our response will remain proportionate to the potential risks posed by travellers and in the context of the international situation.”

New Zealand, to date, had said it has no plans to introduce testing for Chinese visitors, the Ministry of Health said last week.

An ‘abundance of caution’
Australia’s Health Minister Mark Butler said this decision was taken out of an “abundance of caution” and a temporary measure due to the lack of detailed information about the epidemiological situation in China.

“That lack of comprehensive information has led a number of countries in recent days to put in place various measures — not to restrict travel from China, it’s important to say — but to gather better information about what is happening epidemiologically in that country,” he said.

Butler said the government warmly welcomed visitors from China, and Australia was “well positioned right now in the fight against covid”.

“The resumption of travel between China and Australia poses no immediate public health threat to Australians,” he said.

Butler said universities and the tourism industry would also welcome the resumption of travel from China, as would people who had long been separated from their family and friends.

“We know there are many many hundreds of thousands of Chinese Australians who have been unable to see family and friends for months — and, in some cases, years — and their ability to do that over the coming period will be a matter of considerable joy for them, particularly as we head into the Lunar New Year period,” he said.

Butler said that, although the subvariant that appeared to be driving the wave in China was already present in Australia, the situation was “developing very quickly”.

Concerns over new variant
“There are concerns, in an environment of cases spreading so quickly, about the possibility of the emergence of a new variant,” he said.

“Now there’s no evidence of that right now.

“This is a measure taken out of an abundance of caution to provide Australians and the Australian government with the best possible information about a fast-evolving situation.”

Butler said the Chinese government was informed about the measures this morning.

“It won’t come as any surprise to the Chinese government that Australia is putting this arrangement in place, I don’t think, given the broad range of countries that have taken similar steps over the last 48 to 72 hours,” he said.

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

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A leading epidemiologist says Aotearoa New Zealand has no idea how many community cases of covid-19 there are in the country because so many people are not recording their rapid antigen test (RAT) results.

University of Auckland Professor Rod Jackson said an upgrade of the testing system and My Covid Record is desperately needed.

His comments follow the leak of a memo from the Northern Region Health Co-ordination Centre (NRHCC) to health providers in the Auckland region on March 26.

The memo states:

“The MoH shared the following with us this week: in the last month we have distributed 50 million RATs into the system and so far less than 1 million results have been reported.”

The memo goes on to mention the increased number of false positives and negatives that occur with RATs (compared to PCRs) and the need to shift towards more PCR testing immediately.

Professor Jackson said the fact that so many people are not recording their covid-19 RAT results means the Ministry of Health’s daily case numbers are meaningless.

“Those numbers clearly demonstrate that expecting people to report the results of self-administered RAT tests was never going to happen on a consistent basis,” he said. “They are only reliable if they are done by trained people and recorded.”

Looking at hospitalisations
Professor Jackson said he did not even even look at the daily case numbers.

“I look at the hospitalisations and, sadly, the number of deaths,” he said.

But Professor Jackson said, in the middle of an omicron outbreak, a switch back to PCR testing might not be feasible due to the sheer number of people who would need to be tested.

“And my concern is people have got so used to easy access to RATs and now they wouldn’t want to wait in line.”

He said RATs are a tool to help slow down the spread of omicron, but their accuracy can be as low as 50 percent.

Auckland University associate professor of public health and Associate Dean Pacific Dr Collin Tukuitonga agrees that poor recording of RAT results highlights the shortcomings of the Ministry of Health’s daily case numbers.

“The reality is we have no idea of the real numbers because people are either not getting tested or, if they are, they aren’t recording their results,” he said.

Real case numbers far higher
“Some people say the real case numbers could be two or even four times higher.”

He said looking at the overall trend shows case numbers are declining in Auckland.

“But in terms of absolute numbers, we have no idea.”

A Ministry of Health spokeswoman said it has continued to monitor and review its approach to testing throughout the outbreak.

She said RATs are the ministry’s preferred testing method as they can be done at home, the results are available quickly and, when people upload their results, they provide an insight into the spread and size of an outbreak.

“We are still undertaking some PCR testing. However, this is mainly focused on priority populations and those individuals who are at higher risk of the effects from covid-19.”

According to the Ministry of Health, from February 22 to April 4 it has distributed 61.6 million RATs nationwide and between December 13 and April 5, a total of 1,614,110 million results have been recorded.

Local Democracy Reporting is a public interest news service supported by RNZ, the News Publishers’ Association and NZ On Air. Asia Pacific Report is a community partner.

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Bridges is National’s spokesperson for finance and infrastructure.

Kanongataá-Suisuiki said in a Facebook post that she had tested positive on a day 3 test of home isolation, after her daughter had contracted the coronavirus.

In a social media post, she said she had lost her sense of smell and taste, but was “feeling ok”.

Last week, Environment Minister David Parker reported testing positive, and said he had minor symptoms and was “not feeling too bad”.

He had not been in the Beehive since the previous week, so was not with other MPs or staff while infectious, he said.

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