After Containing COVID-19, Can New Zealand and Australia Show How to Reopen?

After Containing COVID-19, Can New Zealand and Australia Show How to Reopen?
Surfers prepare to enter the water at Bondi Beach in Sydney, Australia, April 28, 2020 (AP photo by Rick Rycroft).

New Zealand’s prime minister, Jacinda Ardern, declared victory against her country’s coronavirus outbreak last week. “There is no widespread undetected community transmission in New Zealand,” she announced, as COVID-19 had “currently” been eliminated from the country. New Zealand’s director-general of health, Ashley Bloomfield, echoed the prime minister, saying that the continued downward trend in new infections “does give us confidence that we have achieved our goal of elimination.” The country of 5 million people has confirmed around 1,200 cases of COVID-19 and 20 deaths so for, and recorded no new infections earlier this week.

New Zealand ranks among the world’s most successful countries in containing the coronavirus pandemic, along with Australia, where the daily number of new cases has plummeted from 460 in late March to only 16 last Friday, bringing the total to just over 6,800. The Australian government has not claimed to have entirely eliminated domestic transmissions of COVID-19, but some states in the country, like South Australia, have reported no new cases in the past week.

Now, Australia and New Zealand are beginning to relax the restrictions on movement and economic activity that limited the virus’s spread. While their successful responses to the pandemic can offer lessons for other countries still struggling with major COVID-19 outbreaks, how Australia and New Zealand reopen—and whether they can do so without causing a spike in cases or sparking a political backlash—will be instructive as well.

Keep reading for free!

Get instant access to the rest of this article by submitting your email address below. You'll also get access to three articles of your choice each month and our free newsletter:

Or, Subscribe now to get full access.

Already a subscriber? Log in here .

What you’ll get with an All-Access subscription to World Politics Review:

A WPR subscription is like no other resource — it’s like having a personal curator and expert analyst of global affairs news. Subscribe now, and you’ll get:

  • Immediate and instant access to the full searchable library of tens of thousands of articles.
  • Daily articles with original analysis, written by leading topic experts, delivered to you every weekday.
  • Regular in-depth articles with deep dives into important issues and countries.
  • The Daily Review email, with our take on the day’s most important news, the latest WPR analysis, what’s on our radar, and more.
  • The Weekly Review email, with quick summaries of the week’s most important coverage, and what’s to come.
  • Completely ad-free reading.

And all of this is available to you when you subscribe today.