New Zealand will remove social distancing requirements after reporting zero active cases of COVID-19, indicating it has achieved its aim of eliminating the virus.
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said Monday that all remaining restrictions on people and businesses, other than strict border controls to keep the virus out, will be lifted at midnight tonight, paving the way for a resumption of normal life. The South Pacific nation earlier reported that the last of its coronavirus patients has recovered, making it one of the few countries in the world to have successfully eradicated the pathogen.
"We united in unprecedented ways to crush the virus,” Ardern said at a news conference in Wellington. "Our goal was to move out the other side as quickly and as safely as we could. We now have a head-start on our economic recovery.”