Last night the Government of Niue (GON) confirmed it had detected its first Covid-19 case.
Niue Premier Hon Dalton Tagelagi announced that the positive case arrived into the country on Monday this week together with 26 other passengers, who had all tested negative before departure.
Premier Tagelagi says the positive case is currently in quarantine and will be monitored closely by Niue’s health officials.
“We understand at this stage that the positive case is double vaccinated and boosted and had returned a negative PCR test 72 hours and RATs before boarding their flight from New Zealand.
“Niue has been very fortunate to date with our COVID programme and vaccination roll-out to be possibly the only country in the world without the virus. Luckily with almost all of Niue’s eligible population vaccinated, this has slowed the spread of COVID transmission and will reduce the health impacts in those who may contract this virus,” says Premier Tagelagi.
The country will remain on Alert Level BLUE for the time being.
The remaining passengers returned negative tests but officials will be monitoring and retesting them per testing protocols.
“We have expected this virus, we have prepared for it, and we are ready to contain its spread,” says Premier Tagelagi.
We have remained vigilant; we have caught this case – and now I ask you to remain vigilant too.”
“As we all know, the best defence against this virus is by keeping calm, working together, and making use of all the health and safety precautions that we know make a real difference in protecting us all from Covid-19.”