Ashley Bloomfield says it’s clear mask use is waning even in places where there are mandates. That has driven advice on whether to extend their use, including in schools, he told political editor Jo Moir.
The Director-General of Health has let public “behavioural change" guide his advice throughout the pandemic and it continues to inform decisions around mask mandates.
Many within school communities have been calling for mask mandates for school-aged children as Covid cases have rapidly increased as winter has hit.
The latest advice from the Ministry of Health and Ministry of Education, issued last week, is that masks are “strongly recommended’’ for Year 4 students and above, and schools have been provided material to send parents explaining the importance of mask-wearing where practical.
There have also been calls from school leaders and parents not to enforce a mask mandate and on Monday Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern told media the overwhelming message she had heard is that schools wanted flexibility to manage mask-wearing themselves.
Ardern says she wouldn’t hesitate to enforce a mask mandate, but she’s guided by the advice and that is not what has been recommended.
“We’re still seeing quite high levels of compliance for those requirements, but there’s no doubt even if you look at our existing mask mandates in retail settings and so on, that compliance has waned." - Doctor Ashley Bloomfield
Doctor Ashley Bloomfield told Newsroom all the factors around a mask mandate had been weighed up and the current Government advice of strongly recommending mask use in schools, “is completely consistent with our advice".
“You always need the support of the public, we couldn’t police our way through a lockdown, it still required everybody to understand why, own it, and do the right thing.
“In a sense that hasn’t changed," Bloomfield says.
New Zealand has high levels of compliance around people remaining home if sick, testing for Covid, and household contacts staying at home if someone does return a positive result.
“We’re still seeing quite high levels of compliance for those requirements, but there’s no doubt even if you look at our existing mask mandates in retail settings and so on, that compliance has waned.
“So, it’s about getting that balance right," he said.
“Extending mandates could potentially be counter-productive, and I’ve talked about what we really needed to do was make it as easy as possible for people to wear masks – so get many more out there including to all those vulnerable groups and getting access to N95s."
Bloomfield says a “personal crusade’’ of his was getting boxes of masks out and available when people collect rapid antigen tests, an initiative that started earlier this month.
Schools have returned this week after a two-week holiday and Bloomfield told Newsroom the break from classrooms over the past two years had been “a bit of a circuit breaker at times’’ for rising Covid cases.
“It’s looking like cases are peaking and then going to go back down, it may be a combo of things and school holidays may have played a role in that," he said.
Asked in an ideal world whether he would like to keep schools closed for longer during the winter period, Bloomfield wasn’t so sure.
“There are trade-offs for school closures and schools are only one setting contributing to infection.
“It’s not just schools – it’s workplaces, it’s people engaging and supporting the mask mandates," he said.
Ardern told Newsroom she hadn’t given any consideration to extending the school holiday period because the advice was that the social impacts for children being out of school were too high.
The focus is now on keeping cases down over the next four weeks as the country gets through the thick of winter, Bloomfield says.
“In the first four weeks of term there’s lots of support for schools to wear masks and we’re providing them and encouraging every school to do that for the first four weeks, just as we are doubling down and asking the public to wear masks when they’re required, to get us through winter will be the critical thing.’’
