New Zealand to end quarantine stays and reopen its borders

New Zealand's government on Thursday said it will end its quarantine requirements and reopen its borders, a change sought by thousands of citizens abroad who have endured long waits to return home. Since the start of the pandemic, New Zealand has enacted some of the world's strictest border controls. Most incoming travelers still need to spend 10 days in a quarantine hotel room run by the military, a requirement that has created a bottleneck at the border.

The measures were initially credited with saving thousands of lives and allowed New Zealand to eliminate or control several outbreaks of the coronavirus. But, increasingly, the border controls have been viewed as out-of-step in a world where the virus is becoming endemic and in a country where the omicron variant is already spreading.

The border changes mean that vaccinated New Zealanders returning from Australia will no longer need to go into quarantine from the end of this month, and vaccinated New Zealanders returning from the rest of the world can skip quarantine by mid-March. They will still be required to isolate at home.

However, tourists will need to wait until October before they can enter the country without a quarantine stay. And anybody who isn't vaccinated will still be required to go through quarantine. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said she knows many people associate the border controls with heartache but they have undeniably saved lives.

"There is no question that for New Zealand, it has been one of the hardest parts of the pandemic," she said. "But the reason that it is right up there as one of the toughest things we have experienced is, in part, because large-scale loss of life is not." Ardern said the restrictions had allowed New Zealand to build its defenses against the virus by achieving high levels of vaccination while also keeping the economy running strongly.