New Zealand has done a remarkable job keeping case rates (and death rates) low without vaccines. They do lock downs, then let life get back to normally after.
It's not working though. Cases are going up.
Actually it did work. For the better part of a year, their new case count was in single digits. They are experiencing a spike in cases now, but even then, their per-capita case count is still below that of Canada/The U.S./Europe.
People are sick of Lockdowns.
I don't think New Zealand ever did any sort of long-term/wide-spread lockdowns like we did in Canada. Instead, they implemented strong border controls and contact tracing to keep cases low. When lock-downs occurred they were often more localized and/or short term.
Now, I don't think that strategy would have worked here in Canada. New Zealand is a smaller country that benefited from geographic isolation. With Canada's more extensive travel and trade, we just wouldn't be able to exert the same control.
AND seeing places with much higher case counts acting almost normal (parts of the US and Canada) because of vaccines, must make them feel pretty shitty about their strategy to deal with this pandemic.
...
NSW in Australia now has more cases per day than Ontario.
Ummm... are you mistaking New Zealand for Australia?