{"id":325102,"date":"2026-03-12T01:31:11","date_gmt":"2026-03-12T01:31:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/325102\/"},"modified":"2026-03-12T01:31:11","modified_gmt":"2026-03-12T01:31:11","slug":"250000-kiwis-may-have-long-covid-but-nz-isnt-counting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/325102\/","title":{"rendered":"250,000 Kiwis May Have Long Covid \u2014 But NZ Isn\u2019t Counting"},"content":{"rendered":"

Thursday, 12 March 2026, 1:26 pm
Press Release: Long Covid Support Aotearoa<\/a><\/p>\n

New Zealand isn’t tracking the size or cost of Long Covid
\nnationally. Yet experts estimate our post-Covid illness
\ncrisis could involve as many as a quarter of a million
\npeople.<\/p>\n

In the absence of prevalence data here, Public
\nHealth Communication Centre experts estimate a quarter
\nof a million Kiwis \u2014 roughly 5% of the population \u2014
\ncould have Long Covid. This is within the ballpark of
\nfindings in other countries.<\/p>\n

Long Covid Support
\nAotearoa says better data are urgently needed to understand
\nthe true impact of the condition and to plan appropriate
\nhealth services.<\/p>\n

\u201cLong Covid is no longer a mystery
\nillness \u2014 thousands of research papers have now been
\npublished worldwide,\u201d Long Covid Support Aotearoa Chair
\nLarisa Hockey said.<\/p>\n

Health economics professor Paula
\nLorgelly, lead researcher for the Long Covid Registry
\nAotearoa, says Long Covid\u2019s illness burden is
\nsignificant.<\/p>\n

\u201cQuality-of-life impacts reported by
\npatients are similar to cancer and MS. But the broader
\nsocietal implications of Long Covid are, in the words of UK
\nimmunologist Professor Danny Altmann, \u2018so
\nlarge as to be unfathomable\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n

Long Covid
\nSupport Aotearoa says national prevalence monitoring would
\nhelp policymakers to understand the scale of the issue and
\nensure the health system is prepared.<\/p>\n

Advertisement – scroll to continue reading<\/p>\n

\u201cWithout good
\ndata, it\u2019s difficult to plan services or support people
\neffectively,\u201d Hockey said. \u201cCounting Long Covid properly
\nis the first step towards addressing it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Long Covid
\nis largely absent from the recent Covid-19 inquiry. In both
\nphases, the Royal Commission excluded the condition as
\n\u201cout of scope\u201d. In contrast, the Australian government
\ncompleted a whole
\ninquiry into Long Covid in 2023.<\/p>\n

Long Covid
\nSupport Aotearoa is calling for:<\/p>\n

National Long
\nCovid prevalence monitoring<\/p>\n

Economic analysis on
\nthe cost of Long Covid<\/p>\n

Clear clinical pathways and
\nsupport for primary care<\/p>\n

Ongoing access to
\nCovid-19 prevention measures, including wider vaccine
\neligibility for all age-groups from six months.<\/p>\n

New
\nZealand is also in the dark on Long Covid\u2019s price tag. No
\nstudies have assessed its cost to our economy. Health
\nspecialists have applied a 2024 Australian cost estimate to
\nour country – proposing a figure of more
\nthan $2 billion annually in lost productivity
\nalone.<\/p>\n

\u201cNew Zealand moved quickly to prevent Covid
\ndeaths,\u201d Hockey said. \u201cNow we must ensure the long-term
\nhealth impacts are not
\noverlooked.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\u00a9 Scoop Media<\/a>
\n
\n<\/p>\n

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\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Thursday, 12 March 2026, 1:26 pmPress Release: Long Covid Support Aotearoa New Zealand isn’t tracking the size or…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":35750,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[134,40159,7057,175371,3523,111,24636,139,69,147,11112,2443],"class_list":{"0":"post-325102","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-health","8":"tag-health","9":"tag-health-policy","10":"tag-healthcare-industry","11":"tag-long-covid-support-aotearoa","12":"tag-medical","13":"tag-new-zealand","14":"tag-newsworthy","15":"tag-newzealand","16":"tag-nz","17":"tag-science","18":"tag-scoop","19":"tag-welfare"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/325102","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=325102"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/325102\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/35750"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=325102"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=325102"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=325102"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}