The New Normal

 

This past weekend, someone from Sydney (Australia) flew to Wellington to visit friends and enjoy New Zealand's "coolest little capital city in the world".  He or she returned to Sydney after what sounded like an awesome weekend if all the places he/she visited is any indication.   Apparently, he/she had already received one AstraZeneca vaccination dose and had tested negative for COVID-19 prior to flying.  However, after returning to Sydney on Monday and having symptoms, he/she tested positive for COVID-19.

By all accounts, this person did everything they were meant to do.  It's reported that he/she downloaded and used the COVID-Tracker app that we are meant to be using in New Zealand, because at the last count, there are 14 locations of interest where this person apparently spent time while in Wellington. And yet we still have the outcome of the alert level changing as of 6pm this evening for the Wellington region. 

Someone reading this from another part of the world, may find NZ's way of dealing with this pandemic quite different from his/her own country.  If you're curious how New Zealand is doing things, have a read of this article on Newshub - "As it happened:  All the latest following confirmation of COVID-19 case in Wellington".

I don't live in the Wellington region anymore.  I was, however, travelling to Wellington this morning for work meetings and to take a course tomorrow.  As I walked towards the Air New Zealand check-in kiosk at the airport, one of my work team rang me to tell me that the rumour was that we may go into lockdown again and ask if I was still going to fly to Wellington.  

I asked Air NZ personnel what would happen to the flights if the alert levels changed.  I was told, "I don't think it's anything serious.  We've never been through this before, so we don't really know."  I shook my head in agreement and said, "I guess we just have to see what happens."

I made the decision to continue with my trip and arrived just in time for the press conference which announced the change to alert levels.  All day the emails have been coming fast and furious ... where to work, where you can go, what you can and can't do.  My course is going ahead, but I've decided not to attend.  I'm not sure it's a good idea to sit in a room with 25 Wellingtonians (in Winter) all day discussing mental health when everyone's mental health will be 'touched' by this recent event.

New Zealand ... "The Team of 5 Million" ... has received a lot of praise for how it has been managing the pandemic.  But the longer this goes on, the more this becomes the new normal ... well, I guess we'll just have to wait and see what happens.