Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern is standing by vaccine mandates after making a host of changes to New Zealand's COVID-19 measures including removing vaccines passes and most mandates.
Speaking to reporters on Wednesday, Ardern revealed the changes include an end to outdoor gathering limits, QR codes and vaccine passes. Vaccine mandates will no longer apply to police, education, defence and businesses that currently use vaccine passes. Workers in health and disability, aged care, prison and border will still fall under a vaccine mandate, although many healthcare workers are under other non-COVID vaccine mandates already.
All businesses, however, will retain the ability to voluntarily introduce workforce vaccination requirements following their own health and safety risk assessments.
Indoor gatherings will also be expanded to a maximum of 200 people.
The Prime Minister said the changes were possible because we are coming out of the Omicron outbreak's peak.
"The evidence shows we are coming off the Omicron peak with cases in Auckland having already declined significantly, and a decline expected nationally by early April," Ardern said.
"To date we've had more than 500,000 reported cases of COVID-19 and expert modellers say there have probably been 1.7 million actual infections. That figure, coupled with 95 percent of New Zealanders being fully vaccinated, means we now have a high level of collective immunity.
"New Zealanders have worked incredibly hard to get through this pandemic and as a result of those efforts we are now in a position to move forward and change the way we do things."
She said New Zealand is highly vaccinated and no longer needs to rely on measures such as mandates and passes. But she stood by all the Government's pandemic measures.
"We only ever did things that were necessary to enable us to get through this pandemic as safely as possible and it worked.
"It's one of the reasons we have such a highly vaccinated country now and it's one of the reasons we have the choices we have now too. I know it has been tough but I still absolutely stand by the decisions we've had to make."
The Prime Minister says the mandates achieved what they were meant to and were key to keeping New Zealanders safe.
Ardern said the loosening of restrictions doesn't signal an end to the pandemic. She also wouldn't rule out reintroducing lockdowns or broader mandates in the future.
"As we have said all along, as we can make progress safely we will and we are but you will also hear us always say that there are tools we will keep in our back pocket.
"We won't require vaccine passes but we will keep them in our back pocket, QR codes we don't need to use anymore but let's keep them in our back pocket. The truth is we don't know what this pandemic may produce next but we have a range of tools now that we know in what circumstances we need them and we are ready to pull them out."
When asked whether there could be lockdowns again if a new variant emerged, Ardern wouldn't rule anything out but said that's not what's expected.
"There's nothing that we are currently experiencing that suggests we will need those (lockdowns)...But I think the entire world will be reserving the flexibility that should we see something dire, everyone has a set of tools they can use in those circumstances."
Associate Health Minister Dr Ayesha Verrall said it's impossible to tell how the virus could mutate which is why it's important to have measures available, such as lockdowns, in case they are needed.
The capacity limit changes will take place from midnight on Friday while QR codes and broad vaccine pass mandates, except for health and disability, aged care, corrections and border workforce, will be removed on April 4.
