Vaccinations for Maori made great progress on Super Saturday.A record 21,000 vaccines were administered to Maori yesterday.Associate Minister for Health Peeni Henare told the Weekend Collective the total number is a good thing, but those that came forward for their first dose is just as important."Over half of those numbers were first-time vaccinators, so that's absolutely fantastic, but we still know we've got more to go, but we'll tick the box on yesterday and call it a success."LISTEN ABOVE

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Peeni Henare: First-time vaccinated Maori is just as important as the total number

A suggestion more work needs to be done following the Super Saturday vaccination drive.Just over 130,000 doses were administered nationwide.It means at least 85 per cent of the eligible population has had their first dose.But Auckland University epidemiologist Professor Rod Jackson told the Weekend Collective the vaccine push is far from over.“500,000 eligible Kiwis who are not vaccinated, and that’s where we need to turn our energy to now. We need a different approach.”LISTEN ABOVE

Rod Jackson: We need a different approach to get to the unvaccinated

National's health spokesperson is hailing Super Saturday as a "wonderful" day and a real success.A record-breaking 130,002 people got a Covid-19 jab across the country yesterday.Deputy Leader Shane Reti spent the day vaccinating in a coastal community in Northland.He told The Weekend Collective he's happy with the day's numbers.“I thought if we got anything over 100,000, so the target’s been about 50,000 a day and I thought if we can double that, that it was going to be a good outcome. So I think we should all be pleased to have achieved that.”LISTEN ABOVE

Dr Shane Reti: We should all be pleased with Super Saturday numbers

A political commentator says this is one of the worst weeks for the Government when it came to messaging.After a muddled roadmap for Auckland at the start, it all ended with 60 cases across Auckland, Northland, Waikato and Bay of Plenty.Former politician turned commentator Peter Dunne told The Weekend Collective it could be the week the extended honeymoon the public's had with the Government has started to wane."There seems to be a sense abroad now that what everyone thought of what was happening previously is now not clear what the direction is. There's a sort of a sense of indecision and lack of clarity."LISTEN ABOVE

Peter Dunne: The extended honeymoon between public and Government has started to wane

National says the Government needs to move urgently to make vaccination mandatory in more frontline roles.Cabinet ministers are due to discuss the issue tomorrow.National Covid-19 Response Spokesman Chris Bishop says he expects them to agree to make vaccination mandatory for all healthcare workers dealing with Covid cases.He told The Weekend Collective it's something he's been calling for and fully supports.“Frankly, probably taken too long. At the moment, you could be a nurse, working on someone with Covid in ICU, and not have to be vaccinated. It’s pretty nuts.”LISTEN ABOVE

Chris Bishop: Vaccines should be mandatory for all healthcare workers

Concerns from an epidemiologist following the confirmation of 60 new community cases of Covid-19 today.There are 56 new cases in Auckland, including 17 that are yet to be linked to existing cases.There are another three cases in Waikato linked to the initial Hamilton East case and a case in Katikati in Bay of Plenty that was already announced last night.Auckland University epidemiologist Rod Jackson told Tim Roxborogh and Tim Beveridge he's concerned about the situation in Northland where a Covid case hasn't been cooperating with authorities.“Doesn't look too bad in the Waikato, I think we might stamp out that one. Auckland, we just have to suppress it until we all get vaccinated. Northland, I’m freaking out in a major way because I think we could have big problems there.”LISTEN ABOVE

Rod Jackson: Auckland University epidemiologist says he's freaking out in a major way about Northland

Auckland's Mayor says police were put in a tough position yesterday with a Destiny Church organised anti-lockdown protest.Around 2000 protesters gathered for a rally outside Auckland's War Memorial Museum yesterday.No arrests have been made so far and police had a scant presence there.Phil Goff told the Weekend Collective police could have inflamed tensions if they had been harder."Their preferred approach was to try to keep the temperature down and hold open the option that they will still charge people for breach of the health order."Goff said the event was unacceptable."I was really unhappy with Brian Tamaki and his group of people who thought that somehow they were above the law and they could have this superspreader event while the rest of us were trying to do the right thing for the city."LISTEN ABOVE

Phil Goff: Police were put in a tough position with yesterday's protest

A Covid-19 expert says Waikato's latest outbreak may not be as bad as Auckland's.Parts of the Waikato region will move to Alert Level 3 at 11:59 tonight.Auckland went to Alert Level Four with one case. Auckland University Covid-19 modeller Shaun Hendy says the government might have suspicions the two cases are linked to the Auckland outbreak.He told the Weekend Collective there may be another cause for optimism.“Our vaccination programme is a long way along now, it’s still got a ways to go, but actually, the vaccination programme will actually be cutting spread.”LISTEN ABOVE

Shaun Hendy: Covid-19 modeller says Waikato's outbreak may not be as bad as Auckland's

Efforts to boost ICU capacity are struggling because internationally sought-after nurses can't get into the country, even after accepting job offers and despite the threat to New Zealand from Covid-19.Some critical care nurses who are already in New Zealand on visas are leaving for much higher paid jobs in Australia and elsewhere, after immigration delays meant they couldn't plan ahead.Concerned ICU leaders are set to jointly write to the Government to ask for urgent changes."Hospitals have got people from overseas who would like to come to work with them, but they are struggling to get them in through MIQ. Then there is a backlog of processing things with the Nursing Council. And there are problems with visas," said ICU doctor Craig Carr, who is the NZ regional chair of the Australia NZ Intensive Care Society."The frustration is that even if you interview and get someone, it's a real struggle to be able to facilitate them to get into the country.A shortage of the highly-trained nurses is one of the main reasons why actual, day-to-day ICU capacity hasn't improved since the Covid pandemic began, despite the Government putting up more funding and buying equipment like ventilators.National's health spokesman Dr Shane Reti has recently called on the Government to explain why more ICU bed spaces haven't been secured. The party also wants visa categories to be reopened and residence applications prioritised for critical healthcare workers, as well as offering residence class visas on arrival to experienced nurses.Dr Reti says the short term solution is relaxing our immigration settings to let in the nurses offshore. A longer term solution is to train more nurses here. But he says that’s a seven year plan. LISTEN ABOVE

Dr Shane Reti: Solution to the ICU shortage, relax immigration settings

The Delta outbreak could go either way.New Zealand has 18 new Covid-19 cases today - two are unlinked.Canterbury University's Michael Plank says cases could increase in level 3 - but could also be controlled with strict bubbles and contact tracing.He says we aren't seeing the effect of level 3 yet - but towards the end of this week we'll have a better idea of whether numbers will creep up.LISTEN ABOVE

Michael Plank: We aren't seeing the effect of level 3 yet

A Covid-19 modeller says it's concerning we are still seeing transmission between households.Auckland recorded 24 new community cases of Covid-19 today, and three have yet to linked to the outbreak.Officials say more cases are expected in the coming days, with some new cases in large households.It comes as Cabinet ministers are set to decide tomorrow whether Auckland can move out of Alert Level Four.Canterbury University professor Michael Plank says overall, the cluster is well contained.Professor Plank says the majority of chains have been stamped out, but it's proving difficult to ring fence the last ones.LISTEN ABOVE

Michael Plank: Concerning we are still seeing transmission between households

The Black Caps have arrived safely in Dubai following the cancellation of their cricket tour in Pakistan because of security threats.New Zealand Cricket have confirmed the group of 34 players along with support staff arrived in the United Arab Emirates on a charter flight.They are now in self isolation at their hotel for the next 24 hours.Dr John Battersby from the centre of Defence and Security joined the Weekend Collective to help explain what's happened in the last 24 hours.LISTEN ABOVE

John Battersby: Making sense of the threat to the Black Caps

20 more Covid-19 cases in the community today and experts saying Auckland won't be leaving level 4 anytime soon.But Michael Baker is slightly more optimistic, saying the cases sounded worse initially than they actually are.He says most surprising cases after interviewing and genomic sequencing generally link back to the cluster - making them not so surprising after all.LISTEN ABOVE

Michael Baker: 'Optimistic' we're stamping out this outbreak

20 years on and many are looking back at the 9/11 attacks in the US.The terrorist strikes killed almost three thousand people, two of them New Zealanders.The attack caused former US President George W. Bush to launch a war on terror.Helen Clark was Prime Minister at the time and says that didn't improve the situation.She says many groups still operate today and New Zealand has recently felt the effects through the actions of the LynnMall terrorist.LISTEN ABOVE

Helen Clark: Terrorism, Afghanistan and 9/11

83 new cases of Covid-19 were announced today. Of the new cases, 82 are in Auckland and one is in Wellington - a close contact of a previous case. It brings the total number of cases in the outbreak to 496 in Auckland and 15 in Wellington. Epidemiologist Michael Baker says he'd like to see each day us looking at how people caught the virus. LISTEN ABOVE 

Michael Baker: What we know about the Covid-19 virus

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