There are calls for Taranaki to move to Covid-19 Alert Level 3, with one politician and iwi leader saying there are still plenty of vulnerabilities in the region.
Debbie Ngarewa-Packer is the chief executive of south Taranaki iwi Ngāti Ruanui and co-leader of the Māori Party. She believes Taranaki should be at the same level as Auckland, and says other local iwi agree.
“The community risk has come from Auckland, from Tāmaki Makaurau. We don't understand why it would be Level 3 in Auckland and not in Taranaki. Surely the logical thing would be to isolate the two affected areas. There is real concern on the ground about how this is rolling out.”
According to the Ministry of Health, two of the positive Covid-19 cases, the mother and daughter, travelled to 10 different locations in New Plymouth over Waitangi weekend.
Ngarewa-Packer says iwi are worried about gaps in contact tracing of the Auckland pair. On February 7 the only locations of interest listed are the motel where they stayed, and Egmont National Park.
“We know from looking at the places that have been visited that logistically it doesn't make sense. Someone was here for a day and didn't eat or drink and yet they've been to all these outdoor excursions.”
Ngarewa-Packer says she’s also concerned about PPE supply in Taranaki, after the Government promised 1 million face masks would be sent to vulnerable communities in Tāmaki Makaurau and Taranaki.
A ministry spokesperson said 30,000 face masks have been sent to the New Plymouth foodbank, with additional masks sent to Taranaki DHB for testing purposes.
“Once again the Ministry of Health has sidelined us, saying we’re going to resource foodbanks, all these mainstream organisations. Nothing has come to iwi, they’ve not engaged with us …not a single iwi leader has heard anything about it,” Ngarewa-Packer says.
Those who 1 NEWS spoke to today were divided over whether to move to Alert Level 3.
One woman in the Taranaki Base Hospital testing queue said she’d feel safer if the region moved up a level.
“Taranaki’s really easy to isolate and until we know the extent the virus is in the community, Taranaki should be at Level 3.”
Another couple in Waitara agreed.
“We don’t know where the virus could be, it is a concern for me, that's why I think Level 3 should be given to us as well.”
Chair of the Waitara Alive community group Tracey Bryant said she didn’t think that was necessary.
“I think our communities keeping ourselves safe ... our businesses are onto it. Everyone knows everyone in Taranaki so it’s easy to contact trace.”
Covid-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins said although the Government reviews alert levels regularly, the advice right now is for regions outside of Auckland to remain at Alert Level 2.
In New Plymouth, one café says it’s lost customers over the enforcement of Level 2 rules.
Elixir café is operating a one-in, one-out system for takeaway orders, and has QR codes on the counter, doors and on the menus. Customers are asked to sit a metre apart, with one person at the till at a time.
Assistant manager Dayna Benton says while most customers are happy to comply, some had got upset.
“A couple of people this morning didn't want to follow the rules, they weren't happy about signing in and leaving their details … so we asked them to please leave.
“We’re really trying to stick to what’s best for our staff and our customers, just to keep everyone as safe as possible.”
Meanwhile, queues at New Plymouth’s main testing centre were much shorter than yesterday, when some reported wait times of up to five hours.
Taranaki DHB chief executive Rosemary Clements says she’s pleased with the testing response despite Monday's backlog.
“We averaged a test every five minutes … we did over 500 tests around the maunga yesterday and 25% of those were Māori which of course is our vulnerable population.”
She says concern in the community led to long lines on Monday.
“People were only supposed to come if they were contact plus or symptomatic. It’s fair to say yesterday we had people who were worried and felt they needed to come.”
She says the DHB is reviewing testing capacity “all the time”.
“We’ve got quite a bit of capacity that we can add. Today and yesterday our iwi leaders have been looking at ways to get to their vulnerable population and they’ve been doing testing at mobile clinics and bringing people into their centres.”
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