Government is urging Aucklanders to use some form of face-covering if access to mask was prohibitive.
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern was speaking at the media briefing earlier this afternoon where she emphasised that Aucklanders should be using some form of face-covering whenever going out
The government is ramping up contact tracing regime with a clear instruction to all businesses to display QR codes at their premises within a week.
Announcing this decision during her latest press briefing just a short while ago Prime Minister Jacinda acknowledged that most of the businesses have already started displaying QR codes but now it was crucial with the re-emergence of Covid-19 virus in the community.
Auckland has been put into Alert Level 3 since mid-noon today up to Midnight Friday, August 14.
There was a marked departure in the government’s response to the latest cases of community transmission of Covid-19 (4 persons of a family from South Auckland currently tested positive) as evident in Director-General of Health Dr Ashley Bloomfield announcing the name of two businesses in Auckland and asking all their staffs to self-isolate themselves till they hear from contact tracing teams.
The two businesses pointed were Finance Now - based in Dominion Road and one another based in Mt Wellington for their staffs to go in self-isolation.
This is above and beyond the national contact tracing team chasing each and every staff over the phone as they fall into the category of close and casual contacts, along with their respective employers trying to contact the staff members.
PM Jacinda Ardern explained the reason for this shout out as the authorities were ramping up efforts in contact tracing and therefore using three separate platforms (including the public platform) for further restricting the spread of the Covid-19 in the community.
Emphasising further on the advisory of use of masks in the Auckland region, Prime Minister Ardern encouraged the use of some sort of face-covering with a scarf of any cloth, if access to mask was prohibitive or unavailable.