The January 13 border reopening plans will go ahead but the Government says it is keeping a close eye on the new Covid-19 variant Omicron that is shutting borders around the world.

The new Covid-19 variant, first identified in Botswana and South Africa, has forced multiple countries around the world to impose additional travel restrictions.

The variant named Omicron has prompted concern amongst public health officials around the world because of the unusually high number of mutations that has the potential to make Covid-19 more transmissible and make vaccines less effective.

Last night Australia reported its first community transmission of the new variant, a school student from Sydney, bringing confirmed cases of the Omicron variant to nine in the country. The new case was the first confirmed Omicron infection of a person who had not travelled overseas.

Cook Islands Prime Minister Mark Brown said the country was watching and seeing how the variant develops overseas.

“We have the luxury of being able to do that right now with our isolation, so we will see how events around Omicron develop in other countries,” Brown said.

“We’re sticking with our plans at the moment for the 13^th of January, but we’re keeping a watching brief on Omicron and how it develops.”

Brown said the new variant had not made its way to New Zealand yet, so the country could have confidence Omicron did not travel with the cohort of people who arrived yesterday in managed isolation and quarantine.

He also said the Cook Islands vaccination programme would offer the biggest protection against the new variant, particularly because third shots will be available before the border reopens on January 13.
Te Marae Ora Ministry of Health spokesperson Jaewynn McKay said the situation was being monitored and not much was known at this stage about the virus.