When I checked the ZB website yesterday afternoon to check where we were with the level changes, I didn't feel anything at all when I saw we were going to be staying at red.

I think I'm just desensitized to it all now, but then I'm not somebody whose livelihood depends on indoor audiences or customers being inside. I can't even begin to imagine how you're feeling.

I did suggest yesterday that the Prime Minister's characteristic abundance of caution might mean we would stay exactly where we are and that's what happened. According to the Director General of Health, it's because our health system is under stress.

Listening to Dr Ashley Bloomfield on the Mike Hosking Breakfast, Omicron isn't causing particular stress on the hospital system. The health system has always been under strain, and presumably will be under strain in perpetuity, forever more. As winter arrives, some flus and viruses, and sundry illnesses hit the population, the health system is going to be under stress. So what Dr Ashely's saying is that we have a pretty much a substandard health system that cannot cope with the strain on it, with or without Omicron. So does that mean Red forever?

I found that really interesting that Dr Ashley Bloomfield said it's not Omicron in particular, that's causing stress, so even without it, if we have to stay in red because the hospital system in the health system is under stress, we should have been locked up back in 1973 when the health system was first to fail. It's bizarre.

Can you ever seeing us getting out of it? Unless we can build brand spanking new state of the art hospitals right across the country, when's it going to end?