New Zealand

The first priority group included border and managed isolation quarantine workers and their household contacts.

The second priority group are front-line health workers and people living in high-risk settings such as older people in South Auckland, people in residential care and older people particularly Māori and Pacific.

Aupito William Sio told RNZ Pacific that providers have trusted relationships with the communities they serve, and they will be able to identify and vaccinate the Pasifika elderly in their regions.

The bank admitted breaches of the Financial Markets Conduct Act after the Financial Markets Authority filed proceedings in June last year.

The Authority said ANZ issued duplicate policies to some customers which provided no additional benefits.

It also failed to cancel policies for ineligible customers, while continuing to charge them.

The penalty was in line with the Authority's recommendation to the court.

Cabinet met this afternoon to decide whether the risk of Covid-19 spreading has diminished enough for Auckland to move to alert level 1.

Eight cases that had recently emerged had all been linked and close contacts of the mother of a family at the centre of the outbreak had all produced negative results, she said.

Cabinet had decided to make face coverings mandatory in all public transport across NZ at levels one and two.

The State of the Nation report shows Pasifika unemployment at 8.1 percent, up from 7.4 percent the previous year and nearly twice that of Pakeha at 4.3 percent.

Salvation Army lawyer and policy analyst Ronji Tanielu said the job losses that came with Covid-19 restrictions impacted a lot of Pasifika people.

"If you think about where Pasifika people are located in our industries, we're generally making up hospitality, manufacturing, even some tourism and those were some of the areas that were directly affected by the job losses because of Covid."

The event begun in 2007 to give the Pacific community in Hamilton; an annual Pacific festival; a Pacific early learning space; and a Pacific health service.

K'aute Pasifika is a charitable trust based in Hamilton, providing health, education and social services to Pasifika communities and other ethnicities.

The trust is also the organisers of the Nesian Festival and this year have announced that it will take place on Saturday 27 March 2021 and for the first time, it will be held at the University of Waikato sportsground.

Auckland moved to Alert Level 3 and the rest of the country to Alert Level 2 after three community cases of Covid-19 were discovered.

Genomic sequencing revealed the cases were the UK variant of the virus and authorities were conducting contact tracing to try and determine the origin and extent of the latest outbreak.

Auckland Paediatrician, Teuila Percival, urged Pasifika communities to apply all the lessons learned from past outbreaks.

The trans-Tasman bubble was set up so people could fly from New Zealand to Australia without needing to spend 14 days in a hotel.

However, Australia's expert medical panel made a decision late on Sunday night to change the system.

It means any New Zealanders that fly into Australia from Monday will have to spend a fortnight in hotel quarantine.

The new rule will remain in place for the next three days before the situation is reassessed.

Medical authorities in New Zealand have already approved the Pfizer BioNTech vaccine for use to immunise people 16 years and older.

"We'll be really looking to have conversations with our counterparts in the Pacific around what might be possible with some of those trickier vaccines so that we can see similar levels of protection provided in the Pacific at the same time as we might be seeing that in New Zealand," said Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern.

Ardern said her government was also in discussions about how vaccine distribution will work in the Pacific.

It comes after a robust assessment of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine’s safety, effectiveness and quality by medicines regulator Medsafe.

Covid-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins says the first phase of rolling out the vaccine can now begin.

“Following Medsafe’s approval, Ministry of Health officials will give advice to the Government this week about the ‘decision to use’ the vaccine. This will essentially set out who are most suited to receive the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine, such as age ranges.”

The travel arrangements were paused after a Kiwi woman infected with the highly contagious South African variant of Covid-19 travelled to about 30 locations in New Zealand before testing positive.

The initial 72-hour suspension was extended on Thursday, but flights will now recommence this afternoon.

There were no new community cases reported in New Zealand today.