She argued they needed the chance to catch up. Greens co-leader Marama Davidson told TVNZ's Q&A on Sunday morning she would like the Government to hold off opening the border "until we have equitably high vaccination rates for Maori, and until we have regional health systems that are prepared, and until we have properly tested and refined the traffic light system".ĭavidson said Maori communities started "well behind" in the vaccine rollout because the Maori population is, on average, younger. The Government is forging ahead with plans to reopen Auckland and connect it with the rest of the country with the city moving to the traffic light system "soon after" November 29 and the border coming down (for vaccinated travellers) on December 15.īut Labour's co-operation agreement partner, the Greens, have taken a different position, declaring it "unsafe" to open the border with vaccination rates in some regions still very low. Seventy cases were receiving hospital care, with five of those in ICU. The Bay of Plenty recorded three new cases, the Lakes region four, with Wellington rounding out Saturday's new cases with just one case. Yesterday's cases - which include 97 unlinked cases - were 148 in Auckland, one in Wellington, three in Bay of Plenty, four in Lakes DHB, 12 in Waikato, and four in Northland. Yesterday, there were 172 community cases of Covid-19 in the country, with 148 identified in Auckland. Ī small number of close contacts, including the case's co-workers, have all returned negative results. There are no further case announcements for the Wellington, which recorded one case on Friday. Waikato recorded 6 cases, Northland recorded 3, with the Bay of Plenty and Canterbury recording 2 and 1 cases respectively The person had travelled to the region from Auckland, with a travel exemption. In a statement, the Health Ministry said there were 83 people now in hospital - up 13 from yesterday - including five in intensive care.Įarlier today, a positive case was confirmed in Hawke's Bay and testing is underway in the area. Today, Sunday there were a total of 149 community cases of Covid-19 in the country with 9 out of Auckland. There was no press conference today with the next press conference scheduled for Monday, when Auckland's alert level restrictions will be reviewed.