Transitioning to the Traffic Light System
On Friday the whole country is moving to the Traffic Light System despite not universally making the 90% mark. This is our grand “freedom day” when Auckland will move to the Red level - despite having the highest vaccination rate in the country - and everything can more or less open up as long as they are checking vaccine passes. Some places (like restaurants) are limited to 100 people while others (like retail) will be limited based on 1 meter physical distancing requirements.
The shift hasn’t happened yet and I’m already over the mental exhaustion of opening up the country when covid is still running around unchecked (currently 933 cases over the past two weeks are unlinked) and kids can’t get vaccinated. This mental math is one of the biggest repercussions of covid that my American expat friends have talked about ad nauseam, but my Kiwi friends seem blissfully unaware. The Americans have watched friends and family back home go through nearly two years of living with covid and have seen how the constant worry and stress eats away at everything. We’ve also had more personal experiences with people catching and dying from covid. The general consensus is that Kiwis just don’t get it, and there is a tinge of annoyance at how they’re shocked that you know someone who died. It still isn’t real to a lot of people here.
Ever since the announcement last week that things will open up on December 3, social plans have been trickling in. And I am over having to evaluate each and every invite that comes our way to determine if it is something I feel comfortable doing. 50 person indoor party to celebrate a birthday? Six person partially indoor party for a bunch of 7 year olds? Dinner indoors with a group of five girlfriends? Should I try to organize an end-of-year get together for the parents in my daughter’s class since I’m the class coordinator this year? If so, how would that work and where would it be? After three months living in my happy little bubble (and admittedly I am one of those people who has LOVED lockdown and would happily stay at home indefinitely) I’m happy to pass on these activities and skip the angst surrounding weighing the risks with any event.
To help evaluate things and keep this mental load manageable, we’re following the “Rule of Twos” for most events. There seem to be four ways to protect yourself from covid: vaccinate, social distance, mask, and stay outdoors. Our framework for evaluating things is first put through this filter. If there are two of the four protections present, then it is an option. But this gets a little fuzzy. With vaccinations, for example, if it is people I know who all confirm their vaccination status, that works. However, if it is a general place that is supposed to check vaccines, I’m not quite onboard yet and am taking a wait and see approach. The vaccine passes can be printed out, and as far as I can tell, places aren’t obliged to check to see if the pass is valid or confirm that it belongs to the presenter. And there are fake passes already for sale. People and businesses just have to see a pass. Any pass. It seems a little too squishy for my comfort at this point, but maybe I’ll be pleasantly surprised and find I’m wrong about how the vaccine pass system will work.
For the next few weeks I’ll be keeping a close eye on how people are behaving and how the numbers look. Then I’ll reevaluate how we’re approaching life and interacting with others. The good news is that it is about to be summer and the Auckland border is opening up on December 15. I have a feeling that the city will be it’s safest on December 16 as everyone leaves for their holidays.
Do you have a framework for evaluating the risk of different situations? I’m curious to know what others are doing - if anything.
