23-year old New Zealander Kelly Johnson shares her experience of life inside one of New Zealand’s managed isolation facilities, where she was in quarantine for 14 days.
Quarantine hotels have become temporary homes for many returning to the UK from 33 red-listed countries.
Kelly said: “For me the hotel seemed like the hotspot, even though statistically they are not it just felt that way because it was so visual.
“When you have the army that was a very novel thing for me, especially in somewhere like New Zealand.”
Testing is a crucial part of the process to ensure that the virus does not spread around the hotel.
One of the main conversations surrounding the quarantine hotels in the UK is access to fresh air and exercise, which has also been a discussion surrounding New Zealand’s successful isolation facilities which do allow daily exercise.
Kelly added: “I was more concerned about not extending my stay in the hotel than I was about exercise.
“So I only went out to exercise in those 14 days a handful of times because I was concerned that I might come into contact with the virus.”
Following on from the successes of quarantine hotels to curb rising case numbers in countries such as New Zealand and Singapore this is a pinnacle moment in the UK’s response to the virus.
Only time will tell if the 10-day isolation in a hotel will be enough to ease restrictions further down the line.
