This is while many New Zealanders cannot return home due to the scarcity of MIQ rooms. There are only 4000 total rooms available each fortnight, or less than 300 a day on average, so at that point there were 65 times the number of people looking for rooms as there were rooms available. More Antarctic scientists and staff have been granted MIQ rooms, on top of ones announced earlier this year. More Antarctic scientists and staff have been granted MIQ rooms, on top of ones announced earlier this year. Only around half of the available rooms in the MIQ system are actually used by regular New Zealanders booking through the Managed Isolation Allocation System.

Source: New Zealand Herald September 15, 2021 21:11 UTC