Covid 19 coronavirus: Is Whanganui following alert level 2 rules?

Melanie Walker said locals should not be complacent about contact tracing despite the relatively low risk of Covid-19 in the community. Photo / Bevan Conley

Businesses in Whanganui are impressed with how well locals are following and respecting Covid-19 alert level 2 restrictions but the Whanganui District Health Board says there is still room for improvement.

WDHB chief executive Russell Simpson said there needed to be bit more of a push for businesses and people to be downloading the NZ Covid Tracer app and using it.

"It seems some have really embraced it and others haven't yet and we would encourage everybody whether you are a business or an individual to make sure we can keep track of all of our movements," Simpson said.

He said Ruapehu had a massive push recently and had a really good uptake which was encouraging.

"There's still a few gaps but overall the uptake across the region has been reasonable but I think there's room for improvement on both a businesses and an individual level," Simpson said.

Since entering level 3 restrictions in Auckland and level 2 in the rest of the country last week, the number of registered users of the NZ Covid Tracer app has more than doubled, going from 646,400 to 1,374,000 users as of this past Sunday.

The number of QR codes generated has greatly increased, from 86,927 posters on August 10 to 193,505 on Sunday.

Director of clothing store Just Looking, Melanie Walker, said it was important for people to track their movements and could be hard to remember where you have been if you don't sign in.

"We certainly encourage it," she said.

"I was in Wellington over the weekend and it can be hard to remember where you have been if you are just walking around and not tracking where you have been."

While Whanganui seems far away from Covid-19 cases, Walker said you never know where people have come from and being cautious is the right approach.

"People are realising it's a serious thing. You never know where people have been."

Walker said each day that goes by, the number of people signing and scanning into the store increased.

"It was a bit of a shock to move into level 2 after so long. People were a little blase initially."

Walker said about half of people were using the tracing app and half signing in manually.

Manna Sushi owner Joseph Kim has had to rearrange the seating in his small Victoria Ave shop to allowing for distancing between patrons.

"People have been good. The first few days people weren't so on to it," he said.

Kim said the number of people scanning in on the app has increased each day and that has had no arguments with customers.

Manager of The Blend, Takagiro Ogi, said people had been very compliant with signing in and have had no issues with customers not doing so.

Meanwhile, on the street Whanganui local Tira Nielsen said she didn't have the app as she wasn't "tech savvy" but said her husband does and scans in when they visit stores.

"I just sign in manually if we go anywhere. It's not the end of the world like some people make it out to be. It's for our safety."

Erina Cresswell downloaded the tracer app as soon as alert level 2 came in last week.

She said scans into every store she goes into, and has sent a link to two businesses who didn't have the QR code in their store when she visited.

"I feel it is important to track your movements during this time, for some using the app, for others written. We might know we have been to the supermarket last Thursday but many can't remember the time," she said.

Whanganui DHB encourages everyone to get into the habit of contact tracing as an important defence against the spread of Covid-19.

"Similarly we encourage all businesses and organisations to display QR codes," a spokesperson said.

All businesses must display a NZ Covid Tracer QR code from 11.59am on Wednesday, August 19.