It's been revealed today just how concerned health authorities were about Covid-19 entering the country.
The day before the lockdown, officials advised Cabinet that even New Zealanders shouldn't be allowed to return home.
Today only two new cases of Covid-19 were announced, one confirmed and one probable.
The confirmed case was a Kiwi returning home from overseas, currently in quarantine from overseas - someone that not too long ago, the Ministry of Health wanted blocked at the border.
However Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern says leaving Kiwis stuck overseas was never an option.
"We did not consider that it would ever be okay to stop New Zealanders coming home, you'll struggle to find countries in the world that would make a move like that," she told media today.
Expert Professor Des Gorman says by not closing the borders, New Zealand "squandered our major advantage": the country's isolated geography.
"If the pandemic response strategy was and is to keep it out and stamp it out , then the hard work we have had to do to stamp it out materially shows that we failed to keep it out," he says.
The potential move also raised legal questions, under the Human Rights Act.
Despite that, the Ministry pushed hard.
Foreign Minister Winston Peters said the Ministry of Health had advised it. (Source: Other)
"Most of our new cases were still coming in across the border, so we wanted Cabinet to understand from a public health perspective that if we were to mitigate that risk of cases coming in across the border, ideally we'd close the border for a period," Director-General of Health Dr Ashley Bloomfield says.
"The proof's in the pudding. For an underprepared country we've done remarkably well, and I don't think we were ill-prepared."
At the time, the majority of New Zealand's cases were linked to international travel.
While some were quarantined, many went home to self-isolate.
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