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How Aotearoa New Zealand rapidly revised its Covid-19 response strategy: lessons for the next pandemic plan.
- Source :
-
Journal of the Royal Society of New Zealand . 2021, Vol. 51, pS143-S166. 24p. - Publication Year :
- 2021
-
Abstract
- Public health lessons from one pandemic become the planning assumptions for the next one. Aotearoa New Zealand's 2017 pandemic plan was derived from past experience of influenza. When Covid-19 emerged as a major global health threat, it took time for the realisation to crystallise that this infection was so different from influenza that it required a completely new pandemic response strategy. In this paper we describe how early evidence about SARS-CoV-2 transmission from China led to the adoption of an elimination strategy in Aotearoa New Zealand, making it the first country to choose elimination as a specific policy response. We discuss how further evidence has shaped the selection and design of Covid-19 pandemic control measures such as border restrictions, case and contact management, hygiene practices and use of face masks, physical distancing, and vaccines. This experience demonstrates the need for a different approach to the design of the next national pandemic plan. We identify key early evidence that will be required to develop a flexible and appropriate public health response to a new pandemic threat. We present a framework for a new pandemic plan that aims to learn from the Covid-19 experience by making as few limiting assumptions as possible. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Subjects :
- *PANDEMICS
*COVID-19
*COVID-19 pandemic
*SOCIAL distancing
*SARS-CoV-2
*MEDICAL masks
Subjects
Details
- Language :
- English
- ISSN :
- 03036758
- Volume :
- 51
- Database :
- Academic Search Index
- Journal :
- Journal of the Royal Society of New Zealand
- Publication Type :
- Academic Journal
- Accession number :
- 150210479
- Full Text :
- https://doi.org/10.1080/03036758.2021.1891943