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 Trump sparked uproar in New Zealand when he told a crowd in
Minnesota that the South Pacific country of 5 million people was in
the grip of a "terrible" upsurge in COVID-19 cases, having earlier
succeeded in eliminating the disease.
Thirteen new infections were confirmed in New Zealand on Tuesday,
taking the country's total number of cases since the pandemic began
to 1,293, with 22 deaths. This compares with the U.S. tally of more
than 5.2 million cases and 170,000 deaths.
"You see what's going on in New Zealand?" Trump said.
"They beat it, they beat it, it was like front page they beat it ...
because they wanted to show me something.
"The problem is ... big surge in New Zealand, you know it's
terrible. We don't want that."
Ardern said there was no comparison between New Zealand's handful of
new cases a day and the "tens of thousands" reported in the United
States.
"I think anyone who's following COVID and its transmission globally
will quite easily see that New Zealand's nine cases in a day does
not compare to the United States' tens of thousands, and in fact
does not compare to most countries in the world," she told
reporters.
"Obviously it's patently wrong," she said of Trump's comments.
"We are still one of the best-performing countries in the world when
it comes to COVID ... our workers are focused on keeping it that
way."
New Zealand's death rate per 100,000 people, at about 0.44, is one
of the lowest in the world thanks to strict lockdowns enforced early
in the pandemic. The United States has a death rate of 5.21 per
100,000, one of the highest in the world.
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MYSTERY OUTBREAK
New Zealand has fared far better than most countries during the pandemic, but an
abrupt resurgence of COVID-19 last week in Auckland prompted the government to
extend a lockdown for the city's 1.7 million residents until Aug. 26, while
social distancing rules are in place in other towns and cities.
The origin of the latest outbreak is still unknown, but authorities earlier on
Tuesday ruled out the possibility that it came from frozen food items or
freight.
"Seems clear now that the possibility is being ruled out from that
investigation," Director General of Health Ashley Bloomfield told reporters.
New Zealanders celebrated when the country passed 100 days without any community
transmission earlier this month.
With an election due in mid-October, Ardern is keen to remind voters of her
government's track record on fighting the virus.
"Every other single country in the world has experienced resurgence. We went
longer than many, our outbreak is certainly not as significant as what we are
seeing in Vietnam, in Hong Kong, in South Korea or in Australia," she told state
broadcaster TVNZ.
(Additional reporting by Renju Jose in Sydney; Editing by Stephen Coates)
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