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Northern Ireland will be locked in for four weeks, Northern Prime Minister Arlene Foster confirmed at the Stormont Assembly on Wednesday.
With the incidence of Covid-19 continuing to increase and the pressure on hospital beds, Ms Foster told Assembly members that the hospitality sector will be shutting down for four weeks starting Friday, while the Schools will be closed for two weeks starting Monday.
Take-out meals and deliveries will be allowed, but pubs and restaurants must close for a four-week period, Ms. Foster said.
The sale of alcohol outside of licenses and supermarkets will not be allowed after 8pm.
Churches may remain open, but attendance at weddings and civil associations will be limited to 25 people and receptions will not be allowed. This will apply from Monday.
Funerals will be limited to 25 people with no meetings before or after a service.
People will be warned not to take any “unnecessary trips”. No indoor sports of any kind or organized non-elite contact sports will be allowed.
Gyms may remain open for individual training only, while colleges will be recommended to provide “distance education to the greatest extent possible.”
Ms. Foster said the restrictions were designed to have two impacts. “First of all, on Covid transmission rates, which must be rejected now, or we will be in a very difficult place very soon,” he said.
“And secondly, we think it marks a point where each and every one of us can take stock and go back to messages of social distancing. That is vitally important. ”
Earlier, Tánaiste Leo Varadkar confirmed that the government was likely to consider increasing Covid-19 restrictions in border counties if North Korea entered a four-week lockdown.
Northern Ireland had seven more deaths and 863 cases of the virus reported on Tuesday.
The North Executive met late Tuesday night to discuss the closure proposals. The Executive met briefly around 9.30 pm, but was then suspended until 11 pm after SDLP Infrastructure Minister Nichola Mallon complained that she and the Alliance leader and Justice Minister Naomi Long, they were only shown the new closing proposals minutes before the meeting started.
The latest figures bring the total number of coronavirus deaths in Northern Ireland since the start of the pandemic to 598 and the total number of positive cases to 21,898. In the past seven days, 6,286 people tested positive for coronavirus, nearly 900 a day.
Intensive care
There are now 150 people in Northern Ireland hospitals receiving treatment for Covid-19, 23 in intensive care units and 15 on ventilators. By far the highest incidence of the disease is found in the Derry and Strabane council area, which over the past week had 970 cases per 100,000 residents.
This is more than double the incidence of the next highest area, Belfast, which is experiencing 462 cases per 100,000, followed by Mid-Ulster, with 401 cases per 100,000. The smallest number of cases is found in the council area of Mid and East Antrim: 95 cases per 100,000, and Ards and North Down: 135 cases per 100,000.
The sources said North Korea’s top medical and scientific officials, Dr. Michael McBride and Professor Ian Young, had recommended an impending lockdown period of four to six weeks, with a further similar lockdown in the new year. With the R number, the number of people to whom each infected person transmits the virus, between 1.3 and 1.8, Dr. McBride and Professor Young urged that steps be taken to reduce the number below one .
‘Severely restricted’
They argued, according to Stormont sources, that to achieve this figure the hospitality sector should be severely restricted and / or schools closed for a period of up to six weeks. They said the R number could not be lowered below one if both sectors remained fully open, the sources added.
Sources said Sinn Féin was pushing for a stricter closure, while the DUP wanted schools to remain open and also had concerns about how stricter regulations would affect the economy. – Additional reporting PA
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