New Zealand’s national cabinet will decide on Monday if the nation’s lockdown restrictions can be eased from Thursday after four weeks of strict lockdown measures. Part of the cabinet’s decision depends upon the capacity and timeliness of contact tracing with the chance of undetected community transmission very unlikely. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said the economy would be able to start reopening but social distancing restrictions would remain in place and asked citizens to continue playing their role. Image: AP

New Zealand’s Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern today announced the country would relax its coronavirus clampdown.

The cabinet decided to end four weeks of level-four restrictions at 11.59pm next Monday and move to a level-three lockdown from next Tuesday.

Ms Ardern announced the easing of restrictions despite there still being a small number of new cases in the country each day. Today it announced seven new cases.

"Elimination doesn't mean zero cases," Ms Ardern told reporters. "It means zero tolerance for cases."

She said when the virus re-emerged, authorities would test, track and isolate cases.

"That is how we will keep our transmission rate under one, and it is how we will keep succeeding," he said.

Easing restrictions allows Kiwis to extend their bubbles of people with which they have personal contact, which presents a challenge for contact tracing.

Contact tracing is the process where health officials track down people that have been in contact with confirmed cases of COVID-19, asking them to self-isolate and get tested.

Just as in Australia, officials are hoping to use a tracking app to assist the process, along with diary entries.

Ms Ardern has asked Kiwis to keep a diary of their daily movements to help with contact tracing.

Ms Ardern believes the homespun idea could help the country’s contact-tracers with their work.

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“I would ask New Zealanders to think about doing that. Just keeping a quick note of where you've been, and who you've been with,” Ms Ardern announced yesterday.

“It will not only help them, it will help us.

“If you imagine, even asking someone six days later to account every movement over a period of time, it’s an incredibly hard task.

“So I would ask New Zealanders to have new practices, new things that they do at the end of the day.

“The better that we are able to do … the sooner we can move down the alert levels and the sooner life feels more normal.”

New Zealand will downscale to a level three lockdown, which mirrors many of Australia’s restrictions.

That will include re-opening schools, allowing more businesses — including the construction and forestry industries — to get back to work and let restaurants operate for delivery orders only.

On Sunday, health officials announced just nine new cases across the country, the eighth straight day in which new cases have been no higher than 20.

The country’s death toll stands at 12, after the death of a man in Invercargill last Tuesday was confirmed to be linked to COVID-19.

In keeping with the country’s health-first approach, Ms Ardern announced four criteria that would decide whether the country would relax its restrictions — with none related to the economy.

The first is the satisfaction of health professionals that undetected community transmission is unlikely.

The second is strong contact tracing capacity, the third is the strength of border controls and the fourth is the health system’s ability to stand up.

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New Zealand’s Director-General of Health, Ashley Bloomfield said the country’s contact-tracing was far from a “gold standard” and warned against making a decision.

New Zealand has been one of the few western nations to try to completely eliminate COVID-19, drawing a mixed result of global praise and criticism.

Ms Ardern announced on March 23 that the government would implement a strict level 4 lockdown to prevent the catastrophic death tolls seen in Italy and elsewhere.

The New Zealand government has paid out more than $NZ9 billion ($A8.8 billion) in wage subsidies to businesses, representing more than 1.5 million people, to date.

— with wires