Covid 19 Omicron: Expert calls for return to alert level system as second wave takes hold

An expert is calling on the Government to bring back the Covid-19 alert-level system as the nation wrestles with a second wave of Omicron cases and surging hospitalisations.

Modellers say it's possible that this wave's peak – likely to occur within the coming weeks – may stretch to more than 20,000 daily cases, comparable with the previous surge in March, and double the 8395 new cases reported on Monday.

Otago University senior lecturer in public health Lesley Gray said she doubted a move to the red traffic light would have a significant impact on the daily case numbers.

Gray said the newly relaxed restrictions of the red setting of a limit of 200 people in indoor gatherings made it not much different to current settings.

"I'm not confident the red settings give us enough protections to actually keep the numbers down because it does rely on people adopting the approaches of high levels of vaccinations and boosters and masking and all the usual things that we've been hearing about a lot."

Gray said she would prefer the Government to adopt the old alert system used prior, which was in place during last year's Delta lockdown and had much stricter limits on hospitality venues and social gatherings indoors.

"The traffic light system red and orange make little difference when there are high levels of transmission. I wonder if people are confusing the old red with the higher alert system which puts more stringent restrictions on numbers."

Covid-19 modeller Dr Michael Plank said New Zealand is "definitely in a second wave".

"It's got potential to be quite a serious one. Hospitalisations are rising sharply now and that's concerning because the health system was already stressed with winter illness and flu."

He said it's difficult to predict what the peak will be, but with the average age for hospitalisations climbing, it should be a concern for Kiwis.

Case numbers could rise pretty steeply in the next couple of weeks.
This is just a sum of two exponentials - use with caution! - one for declining BA.2 and one for growing BA.5 with BA.5/BA.2 ratio doubling every ~ 6 days estimated from ESR genome data pic.twitter.com/W9Img4VBLp

— Michael Plank (@MichaelPlankNZ) July 7, 2022

"The increase in the average age is the biggest concern – that means even if cases don't get as high as they did in March, it's possible the number of hospitalisations will increase."

Plank maintains that mask-wearing will be important for flattening the wave.

"We are probably still better at using masks here than many places who I think have fallen out of the habit, that's not to say there isn't room for improvement because there is."