As New Zealand went into lockdown on Tuesday August 18, workers at Countdown supermarkets sprang into action, preparing for an onslaught of customers.
Dalwinder Singh has worked for the supermarket giant for 19 years, and for 12 of those, at Countdown Manukau. She was one of those who worked on the evening lockdown was announced.
She said it was a “stressful” situation but feels for all the families saying “she didn’t wasn’t anyone to be without food”.
Singh wasn’t rostered on but was called in and she went without hesitation.
“I just put on my uniform and went, went for those last three hours,” she said, adding the situation was “mad” but tried to stay positive.
As the days went on, the Ministry of Health continued to update locations of interest , Countdown becoming a frequent place positive cases visited.
As cases of Covid in the community have snowballed, so has the number of close contacts. Countdown’s General Manager Corporate Affairs, Safety and Sustainability, Kiri Hannifin, yesterday called the situation "tough going" as 1900 of the team were self-isolating after 25 stores were impacted and 9 stores closed.
There are now 210 cases across Auckland and Wellington. (Source: Other)
She said it was expected stores would continue to become locations of interest but the business is trying to mitigate the situation.
"We’re expecting these numbers will continue to increase. In the last week since lockdown started we have brought 230 new permanent and 360 temporary team members on board to help, and our recruitment and store teams are working as hard as they can to help navigate this unusual situation," Hannifin said in a statement.
The Director-General of Health, Ashley Bloomfield told Breakfast the country may not see new case numbers level off until about today or tomorrow.
“It could be another big number again today. This is Delta, and it’s showing itself as Delta…it’s like a whole new virus.”
But, he said the country was “pulling out all the stops” to try and combat its increased infectiousness.
Have you returned a positive Covid test and want to share your experience? Email: Jane.Nixon@tvnz.co.nz
Singh’s place of work was singled out as a location of interest on August 22 after a positive case visited the store three days prior.
“Like a lot of staff we got stood down,” she said.
But after following Ministry of Health guidelines and self-isolating for set days, the outcome has been positive for her.
Singh is going back to work today after returning a day five negative Covid test.
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