New Zealand’s daily COVID-19 cases fall, some classrooms to reopen

Daily COVID-19 cases in New Zealand fell on Wednesday after a record jump the day before, with most infections still in Auckland as the Delta variant of the coronavirus continues to affect the country’s biggest city. Authorities reported 60 new COVID-19 infections on Tuesday, of which 56 were in Auckland, taking the total number of cases in the current outbreak to 2,158. There have been 28 deaths in total since the pandemic began and 43 people are currently hospitalized because of the virus.

Classrooms Reopen

Auckland has now been locked down for more than two months, though New Zealand’s total cumulative load of 4,854 confirmed cases is far lower than many comparable countries.

The government has shifted to a strategy of living with COVID-19, and education minister Chris Hipkins on Wednesday said senior secondary school students in some areas would return to classrooms from next Tuesday.

“This is a complex issue requiring difficult trade-offs between improving education and increasing potential health risks for children and young people,” Hipkins said at a news conference.