COVID-19 Update #76 - 11 Whiringa-ā -Rangi 2021 Rāapa, 11 Whiringa-ā-Rangi 2021COVID-19 Update Pānui no. #76.If you have symptoms of the coronavirus, call the NZ Covid-19 Healthline on 0800 358 5453 COVID-19 Pānui no. 76 Ki te kotahi te kākaho ka whati, ki te kāpuia, e kore e whati. If there is one stem it will break easily, but if bundled together they will never break (Nā Kingi Tawhiao) Kia ora e te whānau, we understand that there may have been some confusion yesterday with messaging on the news, or what you may have heard from different agencies in regards to testing. Our messages remain the same, first vaccination by November 15, 2021, and fully vaccinated by January 1, 2022. However, if you are in an Alert level 3 region, and have not been fully vaccinated by 15 November (ie two doses), you are required to be tested and return a negative result before returning to work, and then repeat the test once a week for the nasal or throat swab, or twice a week for the saliva test. Please refer to our FAQ’s for further information. This applies to all kaimahi, volunteers, whānau awhi and people who regularly interact with our mokopuna at Kōhanga Reo while in an alert level 3 setting. The Early Learning Update released last Wednesday 3 November, outlines who the Health order applies to. However, this may not meet our standards of Whaioranga or Wellbeing, or represent our benchmark for maintaining the health and safety of our mokopuna. The vaccination mandate under the public order further complicates the situation. In essence, it is up to whānau through their tūtohinga to develop their own guidelines around how they keep their mokopuna, whānau and kaimahi safe. Your health and safety policy alongside your pandemic plan should provide clear guidance about how you can safely hold hui and events, or transport tamariki. The question we need to ask is, as a Kōhanga Reo, how vulnerable are our mokopuna, and what measures we need take to safeguard our collective health and wellbeing? Tomorrow our next Podcast of “Whaioranga” at 2:30pm will be with Andrew Hema, HR Manager to the Kōhanga Reo National Trust. We will endeavor to answer your most pressing questions on the topic of employment matters. Please note we may not have all the answers, but we will follow through. In the end, the choice is yours as a whānau, kaimahi and Kōhanga Reo and there is still so much to do. Nō reira kei a koutou te tikanga, kei a tātou te ara tika. Ngā mihi Current Situation A reminder that Upper Northland shifts to Alert Level 2 at 11:59 pm tonight, Thursday, 11 November. Auckland and Parts of Waikato remain at Alert Level 3 step 2 and settings will be reviewed again on Monday 15 November 2021. Today, there are 185 new cases in the community: 152 in Tāmaki Makaurau, 25 in Waikato, and 8 in Northland. This brings our total community cases in the current outbreak to 4,998. Eighty-one of today’s new community cases have yet to be linked, and 43 of yesterday's cases were potentially infectious in the community. There are now 84 people in hospital, with 10 in ICU/HDU. Over half (46 people) of hospitalised cases were unvaccinated prior to admission, and 10 people were partially vaccinated, having received their first dose more than 14 days before becoming a case. The average age of the current hospitalisations now sits at 52. Today, there are seven confirmed cases in Northland and one who is still being investigated. Three of the cases are from Dargaville, two are in the Far North, one in Whāngarei and one is in Kaitaia. All cases are currently in isolation. There were 1,517 people vaccinated in the rohe yesterday, with about 60 percent of those in the Far North. Māori made up more than half of these vaccination figures, nō reira ngā mihi nui ki tō tātou whānau kei konei. Twenty of today’s Waikato cases are in Hamilton, four in Ōtorohanga, and one in Cambridge. Fifteen of these cases are known close contacts from a single household in Hamilton, where an earlier case had been confirmed and is already isolating. There were 1,879 test processed yesterday and 1,855 vaccinations administered. Ministry of Education Updates By now, Kōhanga Reo should have advised all kaimahi in writing of the requirement to be vaccinated by 15 November and encouraged them to get vaccinated. You should have also requested the required contact and vaccination information from all your kaimahi and understand who has already received their first dose and who has yet to do so. In yesterday’s Ministry Bulletin and in our Covid Update pānui no. 67, templates have been provided to assist Kōhanga Reo Whānau management committees to advise kaimahi of their duty to be vaccinated. If you have not already done so, an updated template has been prepared and provided to your District Managers, so please contact your Kaitohu-a-Rohe as soon as possible to obtain a copy. Employment steps to take from 16 November Firstly, ensure that you have received, compiled, and securely stored the contact and vaccination information from all kaimahi. As advised in yesterday’s Kaimahi Vaccinations Register pānui, this information can now be stored in Edge. If you have not received this information from a kaimahi, you must assume that he/she has not received their first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine. Please review the MoE’s summarised flowchart of the steps for this process. You should kōrero with the kaimahi to determine whether they can undertake mahi in a way which means they will not have contact with tamariki and are not onsite when tamariki are present. You should discuss alternative working arrangements where possible, such as offsite duties that can be managed without risk of transmission. The Kōhanga Reo whānau will need to determine whether any alternative options are available and assess whether the health and safety risk to you and others is manageable. If alternative duties are not available, then you may need to discuss discretionary leave while they wait for the application to be processed by the Director-General. Please refer to our vaccine mandate FAQs for further information on these steps and processed, which can be accessed at the bottom of this pānui. For today’s MoE FAQs additions, please refer to their bulletin here. AstraZeneca vaccine information and availability The Director General of Health has announced that on 10 November, an alternative to the Pfizer COVID 19 vaccine may be available in approximately one month. If the exemption for the kaimahi is approved, you will need to undertake a health and safety assessment to allow that kaimahi to work on site where tamariki may be present, as they would for any other exempted kaimahi. The MoE have provided guidance about how to undertake this assessment in yesterday’s bulletin on 10 November. For any further assistance, ring 0800 KOHANGA or 0800 564 2642 Kia mau ki te aka matua kaua ki te aka taepa. Nāku noa, Angus Hartley Tumu Whakarae | Chief Executive |