Covid-19 coronavirus Delta outbreak: Zizi Sparks: Other cities need to pick up MIQ load

The Ibis Hotel is one of Rotorua's three MIQ facilities. Photo / File

OPINION

Here in the Bay of Plenty, it's easy to feel as if everything is back to normal.

At alert level 2, many of us are able to return to our places of work, we can dine out and go to retailers and other businesses.

While we still need to wear masks and scan in wherever we go, for the most part life appears to be back to how it was before the snap lockdown last month.

Auckland remains at alert level 4 but the lockdown was short-lived for the rest of the country.

Since the start of the pandemic, Auckland has done most of the heavy lifting for New Zealand. I have friends who live there who are still having catch-ups over Zoom, sending one person in the household to the supermarket and craving a barista-made coffee.

However, we have all played a part, especially the people of Rotorua.

Rotorua is home to three managed isolation and quarantine facilities. It is the smallest city to house these facilities and the only one in the Bay of Plenty, despite neighbouring Tauranga being the fifth-most populous nationwide. The only other cities with MIQ facilities are Auckland, Hamilton, Christchurch and Wellington, which has just two.

For the last month, there has been rising opposition to the possibility of Rotorua being forced to have more MIQ facilities.

The Lakes District Health Board made an urgent plea to the "powers that be" that it does not take on additional facilities because of staffing pressures.

Councillors and MPs are united in their opposition.

To date, the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment, which runs MIQ, has confirmed it is investigating additional managed isolation facilities in Rotorua but decisions are yet to be made.

There are plenty of options in district health board areas that are not already under pressure.

Queenstown has repeatedly come up as a place to bring on board but the cost of flying people there has been raised as a concern.

If people are already being flown to Wellington, why not bus them to Tauranga or Palmerston North or Whanganui? Are large hotels the only option?

No city wants MIQ facilities if there is a risk of the airborne Delta variant getting out, but we all need to play our part.

Auckland has played its part and so has Rotorua. It's time for other locations to step up.