A COVID-19 expert claims a third wave could have been avoided had the Government not scrapped the protection framework and moved towards more modern, more effective vaccines, more quickly.
It follows a significant spike in cases, with 6000 reported on Tuesday - the most New Zealand has seen on a single day in more than three months.
"We're seeing cases doubling every three to four weeks at the moment," COVID-19 modeller David Welch said.
Tuesday's numbers have brought the seven-day rolling average of COVID-19 cases to 4041, but Welch said we could see as many as 11,000 cases a day just in time for Christmas.
He said it's partly down to the Government getting rid of the COVID-19 protection framework.
"It would have been useful to maintain something like the fire warning system, low danger, medium danger and high danger and give some appropriate guidance," Welch said.
Epidemiologist Professor Michael Baker said mask use should be more widely encouraged.
"I would like to see mask use in health care and aged care extended to public transport because people spend a lot of time in a very enclosed space with poor ventilation."
When Newshub asked the public if they were worried, people had mixed opinions.
"No no, because we're fully vaccinated," one couple said.
Another person said: "You don't have to wear masks, no one needs your vaccination certificate, so I just forgot about it."
"Now I just think we have to live with COVID," a third person said.
Twenty-six percent of Tuesday's COVID-19 cases were reinfections.
"There's kinda a handful of variants and they all share a similar mutation in the spike protein helping the virus to better evade immunity, so we're seeing more and more people getting in for the second or third time," Welch said.
He said more modern, more effective vaccines are out there but the Government and authorities have been too slow to act.
"There are boosters out there, in use in other parts of the world, that are more targeted at current variants that we have here, but unfortunately, it's not available and there's no indication it will be available this year," Welch said
The Government hasn't responded to Newshub's request for comment but all indications are that we're in for a COVID Christmas
