Rising from behind Kawau

Woke early this morning, and was in the middle of eating porridge and starting the Guardian cryptic when I glanced up and saw the sun caught between the highest point of Kawau Island and the bottom of the cloud bank in the east. 

Started dealing with work emails and preparing for the many Zoom meetings of the day. I was fortunately able to get enough of a gap to do a quick supermarket visit. Otherwise it has been one of the longest work days I have had, and all from home using modern technology. The great advantage is that currently I have no one hour + commute each way.

On this day 22 of Auckland's fourth lockdown, we have been told that there were just 15 new cases yesterday. Down from four days of 20 or 21. Links have been made for almost all of these 15 with previous cases. This augurs well for the ultimate success of the New Zealand Government's approach.

We have been criticised for locking down the country more than have other countries. Certainly NZ lockdowns have been more stringent than many other countries; however, the total time NZ has been in lockdown is less than most other countries, and our economy has been less damaged than most. More immediately important however, is that we have had only 27 deaths attributed to Covid, little more than 0.5 deaths per 100,000 population.