Love of Dr Ashley Bloomfield is once again reaching a fever pitch across New Zealand, this time after he revealed he owns a delightfully nerdy reusable facemask emblazoned with the TARDIS from UK television show Dr Who.
The Director-General of Health brought out one of his reusable masks at Friday's national 1pm COVID-19 briefing after being asked over the correct way to wear them.
Dr Bloomfield told reporters, "there are various patterns on the internet" for making your own mask, but the reusable one he was demonstrating was "made by the mother of one of my son's friends".
"I also have had a lovely one sent by a member of the public, which has got a TARDIS on it which is nice," he added.
The TARDIS (Time and Relative Dimension in Space) is a fictional time machine and spacecraft that appears in the British science fiction television series.
Upon being asked to demonstrate the correct way to put on a mask, Dr Bloomfield said "this is always a little dangerous", referring to some of the mask fails we've seen in the media in recent weeks.
"The important thing here is to hold the elastic at the ends and keep the hands away from the mouth and face. It goes here over the ears - in my case not too difficult to do."
Dr Bloomfield did reveal his major issue with masks though.
"My glasses do fog up a bit, you will notice," he said. "Apparently you can use sellotape across the top to help with that".
Twitter went berserk after the briefing, with people desperate to out the member of the public who sent Dr Bloomfield such wonderfully 'geeky' mask design.
"Which horny bish sent Ashley Bloomfield this TARDIS mask," comedian Eli Matthewson wrote.
"My wife has swooned over the news that Ashley Bloomfield has a COVID mask with the TARDIS on it, " wrote another person.
"OK... we're at Ashley Bloomfield has a TARDIS face mask level of NZ cuteness," added another.
Several excellent jokes were also made comparing Dr Who to the World Health Organisation (WHO).
Viewers can only hope that next week they might see a glimpse of the mask, but TARDIS-emblazoned masks might just be the hottest fashion accessory this spring.
