Nau mai haere mai – and welcome to our final newsletter of the year.
And so we say haere ra to 2021 – otherwise known as 2020: the director’s cut. Quite a year it’s been, too, from that last golden, post-elimination summer, to the arrival of Delta and more lockdowns, a massive vaccination drive, and now ominous Omicron at the door.
If the year has taught us anything, it’s that predictions in a pandemic are a fool’s game. Modelling and epidemiological forecasting have been wonderful tools in the nation’s COVID response, yes, but no one can confidently say where we’ll be in a few months, let alone how this global crisis will play out in the long term.
For now, though, we have relative freedom of movement and another summer is here. Hopefully it’s a time to take a step back, reflect, relax … and maybe even read a little more. To that end, my colleague Veronika Meduna and I have choses ten of the more timeless stories from the year that might help start the odd conversation around the barbecue. (And not one is about the virus!)
We’ll be back in January and will be publishing intermittently until then, too. From all of us to all of you, Meri Kirihimete and all the very best for the holidays. Mā te wā.
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