New Zealand to drop COVID vaccine mandates for some jobs

New Zealand will do away with vaccine passes and vaccine mandates for some of the workforce in early April, reported from foreign media.

The prime minister, Jacinda Ardern, announced the changes on Wednesday morning, citing high vaccination rates, better data to identify which environments are high risk, and modelling that suggests the country’s Omicron outbreak would peak in early April.

"We’ve been signalling for some time that when we come off the peak, that would be the time to be able to ease the use of things like vaccine passes and mandates,” Ardern said.

The changes include scrapping all gathering limits in outdoor settings and removing requirements for people to use the COVID-19 tracer app to scan in when entering businesses. Hospitality and other venues can increase their indoor gathering limit from 100 to 200 from Friday.

From April 4, vaccine passes will no longer be needed to get into shops and venues, and vaccine mandates will be dropped for workers in education, police and the defence force. Those working in health, corrections, aged care and at the border will still need to be vaccinated to work.

www.anews.az