Epidemiologist Simon Thornley believes a spike in Covid-19 cases is imminent, but another lockdown is not needed.

As New Zealand heads into winter, Mr Thornley expects Covid-19 to follow other coronavirus' which have winter seasonal peaks.

"We've seen that in other countries, for the example in the Hokkaido in Japan, they had several days of zero cases and then they had another spike after lockdown was lifted"

"We need to think about carefully what we do under those circumstance."

He says hospitals in New Zealand and Australia have not been under threat during the pandemic, and there is push for a proportionate response.

Mr Thornley adds we need to protect our elderly but it would take a lot to justify another period of strict isolation.