PROTECT
Biosecurity Watch Go hard, go early – Covid and the New Zealand Biosecurity System SOPHIE BADLAND
IN THE past year, biosecurity has been well and truly thrust into the global spotlight with the rapid worldwide spread of SARS-CoV-2, the virus causing the respiratory disease commonly known as Covid-19. At the time of writing this column, there had been 95.2 million reported cases worldwide, and more than two million deaths. While in New Zealand we are somewhat fortunate to so far have avoided a mass outbreak of the kind that overwhelms hospitals and medical centres, most other countries have not been so lucky and life in those places is very different now to what it was even a year ago. Compulsory mask-wearing, social distancing, multiple lockdowns, travel bans and disruptions, mandatory isolation and seeing friends and family not in person, but via a computer screen, are all becoming a normal part of life frighteningly quickly. New Zealand’s Covid-19 situation to date somewhat parallels our biosecurity system, which is widely recognised as being world-class. The system is designed to be a net, not a wall. As good as the system is, the sheer volume of people and goods usually arriving on our shores from all over the
“The lessons every single one of us have learned from the Covid experience can (and should) be applied to other unwanted pests and diseases.”
world means inevitably some pests and diseases will slip through - as Covid-19 did. Although we all knew it was coming, there was not a lot of time to undertake readiness planning, and it took some time before the New Zealand Government was able to gain reasonable control of the situation. Initially once a detection occurred, the patient was isolated and restrictions placed on their movement and others close to them were tested and also isolated. Anyone elsewhere in the country experiencing symptoms, or who had been in contact with the confirmed cases, were urged to go and get tested. When community transmission of Covid became apparent, it was realised that these measures were not enough to eradicate the disease or even prevent it spreading further. As a result, strict restrictions and testing were put into place at the border, and the Alert Level system was introduced, resulting relatively quickly in a nationwide lockdown. The current measures for Covid more closely resemble the way the New Zealand biosecurity system usually functions. Before coming into New Zealand, people must now complete pre-border checks – Covid tests, supply the appropriate documentation, and make arrangements for a place in managed isolation and quarantine (MIQ). The biosecurity system also requires pre-border documentation, manifests, declarations, phytosanitary certifications, and sometimes treatment or testing of goods prior to import or arrival. In the normal course of events, much biosecurity verification, inspection, testing and treatment occurs at the border. Quarantine officers screen and inspect risk goods declared by travellers and importers, a shipping container hygiene system is in place, aircraft must have a current disinsection certification and detector dogs and x-rays are used to detect risk items that have not been declared
IF YOU SEE ANYTHING UNUSUAL
CATCH IT . SNAP IT . REPORT IT . Call MPI biosecurity hotline 0800 80 99 66 24 / Winepress February 2021
