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Download AudioNational Party health spokesperson Shane Reti says a failure to invest in the health sector is being shown up with the second wave of Omicron coming through.
He says the ways to keep Covid at bay haven’t really changed through the pandemic – mask, isolate, vaccinate, wash your hands and observe cough hygiene.
What’s changed is the fatigue of the Covid response and the complexity of the traffic light settings.
“Of course maybe things would be different from the restrictions we do have and maybe our response here, particularly in the hospital sector, if we had built more ICU beds and if we had thought about the health workforce shortages more seriously because her today, that’s what’s increasing the ED waiting times, that’s what’s increasing the specialist times, delaying surgery. We just don’t have enough healthy arms and legs in the sector,” Dr Reti says.
There were 11854 new cases of Covid-19 reported yesterday and 17 deaths.
There were 66803 active cases and 710 people in the hospital.
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