Travel bans won’t stop the virus

In his letter Safety first, not revenue (March 5), Dr Kleboom promotes the view that travel bans are an effective public health tool to stem the tide of coronavirus. Unfortunately, that is not the case. Only 41 of the 194 member states of the World Health Organisation have introduced travel bans in response to Covid-19, with the UK and Canada among a large majority that have chosen instead to employ modern public health strategies.

Ultimately, of course, the decision to impose a travel ban has not been successful. Coronavirus has rapidly arrived in New Zealand as it was always destined to do. Stories abound of people evading restrictions by travelling through third countries to reach New Zealand. Stigmatisation is occurring on public transport and in our schools and universities. Thousands of students are trapped in China unable to continue their studies. The economy has faltered and our relationship with China is at a low ebb.

The proposal to temporarily lift travel restrictions on students from China (excluding the Hubei province) followed by pre- and post-flight checks, two weeks of isolation in standalone quarantine facilities, and a final check before they return to class, exceeded Ministry of Health guidelines and posed no measurable risk to public health.

Grant Guilford, Vice-Chancellor, Victoria University of Wellington

She’s dreaming

Nothing could more graphically illustrate the desperate need to get rid of the hapless Labour coalition currently governing New Zealand than the sight on TV’s 1 News of Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, apparently in deadly seriousness, telling us that tourists from northern Italy and South Korea arriving for a two or threeweek holiday in New Zealand will be told that they must self-isolate for 14 days as a preventive measure to reduce the spread of the coronavirus.

The very idea is laughable and ridiculous. Will someone please ask the prime minister to leave Fantasyland and touch down again in the real world and accept that she is dreaming.

Brian Kennedy, Khandallah

Keep it balanced

Your sensible editorial cautioning overreaction to the coronavirus (March 3) was undermined by the emotive headline

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and simplistic ‘‘analysis’’ of poll results paraded on the front page only two days later.

The anxieties of some New Zealanders certainly deserve reporting but the worthy intent of your editorial comments would have been better served by placing these survey results alongside the far more measured piece by David Cohen buried in the inside pages.

David Pearson, Karori

Fishing crimes exposed

The fact that the sunken fishing boat ($500k fine after fishing boat sank in 2 minutes, March 5) had not been confiscated before its sinking (while having more than 23 tonnes of illegally caught fish on board) paints a clear picture of how often it would have done this before its sinking. How much illegal bycatch would it have had on board during its previous fishing expeditions, how many hundreds of tonnes of ‘‘overits-permitted-quota’’ would it have fished from our oceans and how much of this would have gone to dubious and unscrupulous ‘‘middlemen’’?

At the same time, experts, like David Attenborough, are warning about losing entire layers of fish from the oceans. We have to look no further for the main culprits, long before we dreamt up our latest ‘‘global warming’’ theory.

While this happened in 2017, and may well be a result of lack of ocean policing from the previous government, you just wonder how much worse it would be now, since the current coalition government has, arguably, vested interests in good relationships with the much larger fishing industries’ players.

A lot of this blatant greed is hidden from us, the voters, under the pretence of job creation and contribution to GDP. A very shallow excuse.

We (the taxpayers) probably won’t recover this $500,000 fine, since all or most of the 20-tonne illegal catches, would have been paid in untraceable cash.

Clearly, past and present governments have let the gullible voter and honest taxpayer down, big time.

Rene Blezer, Taupo

Arming police

New Zealand has trials involving armed police callouts. New Zealanders must decide if we’re still proud of our tradition of policing unarmed or if we want to retain the current gun laws that allow unlimited numbers of untracked guns to be available in society.

Right now, if it were one of my family on police callouts, I’d want an even playing field, and it appears police have already realised that, yet again, they’re about to be let down by politicians who have once again been lobbied by a tiny minority group who think their right to unfettered gun access is more important than community safety.

The Arms Legislation Bill encapsulates changes sought by police since the Thorp Report in 1997. Last September a poll found 70 per cent of New Zealanders and 81 per cent of Cantabrians support strengthened gun laws. If you support stronger gun laws and want to retain unarmed police, email your NZ First and National candidates and their leaders, and tell them now.

Jane Jones, Christchurch

Hutt Valley wishlist

Chris Bishop’s wonderful vision for the Hutt Valley (Three ways to start solving Hutt problems, March 5) is like a child’s Christmas wishlist posted off to the North Pole, but never seen by the parents. Come Christmas Day the child is cruelly disappointed and comes ever closer to not believing in Santa Claus.

If Bishop thinks the list (which contains nothing new) will get him votes, he is mistaken. Only results count and, so far, apart from a promise on the Melling interchange, and the huge traffic conduit that is Transmission Gully, with its potential to create even greater chaos in Wellington as it funnels northern vehicles into the city, not much is happening.

Making lists is the easy part; wondrous concepts and dreams are so much hot air until someone, somewhere, bangs a fist on a table, throws down a pile of cash and starts a bulldozer.

Come on Mr Bishop, keep prodding the decision makers and money holders where it hurts and actually get something useful done. You may well have your chance after September.

Allen Heath, Woburn

Remember Paris?

I was stunned to read in MP Chris Bishop’s column that he advocates for more highways to solve some of those problems. Does he not recall that Parliament ratified the COP15 Paris Accord? It commits us to reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Has he forgotten that his party was the government at the time? More highways would inevitably increase greenhouse gas emissions. Better public transport, walking and cycling facilities would help us to meet our commitment to trying to stave off the climate emergency.

J Chris Horne, Northland

Water meters too dear

Councillor Malcolm Sparrow is reported as saying that meters would be a strong incentive for people to be more careful with the water they use (Water charges on the agenda, March 4). Perhaps so but some years ago, the estimate for installing water metering in Wellington was of the order of $14 million. This level of expenditure would be better directed towards actually saving water by upgrading the infrastructure, so stopping failures and leaks.

Jim Pearce, Newtown