How did this happen?
New Zealand did not start testing all arrivals until June 9, two months after setting up the Managed Isolation and Quarantine (MIQ) facilities. The 24 days finished on June 16, and, during that time, 5885 people landed in the country.
“It’s important to remember that all of those 5885 arrivals did spend 14 days in managed isolation,” says Plank, a Canterbury University maths professor and principal investigator at Te Pūnaha Matatini.
“That is what does most of the heavy lifting of reducing the risk of onward transmission in the community, because it’s unlikely – though not impossible – for people to still be infectious more than 14 days after infection.”