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The number of people infected with the coronavirus (COVID-19) has dropped by a fifth in a week, but it is too early to ease quarantine conditions, says Interior Minister Agnė Bilotaitė.
“Lithuania in Europe still remains among the leaders in terms of the number of COVID-19 infected, but there is something positive: the curve of the epidemic has started to change for the better and the weekly number of infected people is already decreasing. current measures, the drop is minus 20 percent, ”said A. Bilotaitė after the meeting of the Government Emergency Situations Commission (VESK) on Monday.
According to her, the WESC on Monday did not consider easing the quarantine conditions, the review of the restrictions is scheduled for January 17.
The minister said he could not rule out what restrictions could be relaxed, as solutions would be proposed by experts and not politicians.
“No decisions have been made on the changes today, because it is too early to make decisions. On January 17, we will definitely be able to assess the situation, the numbers themselves in more detail and clarity, and consequently make appropriate decisions on the examples. of quarantine restrictions, “said the Minister.
“In short, we are on the right track and it is necessary to maintain the current restrictions, as examples such as the Czech Republic and Ireland, where it was decided to release (conditions) as the situation improved, showed that the epidemic curve skyrocketed after those. decisions “. A. Bilotaitė spoke.
According to her, due to the restriction of population movement between municipalities, population mobility was reduced by 79 percent, but it is still higher than during the first quarantine in the spring.
Lithuanian chief epidemiologist Loreta Ašoklienė noted that both the total number of new COVID-19 cases and the percentage of infected people from all studies are declining, but urged not to rush to be happy with the results as these are data to short term.
“A week ago, the morbidity rate was 100,000. The population reached 1,226 in 14 days, today it is 1,005 cases, but it is one of the highest morbidity rates in Europe. Another indicator is the proportion of positive tests of all the investigations carried out, we see that there are changes, if a week ago the proportion of positive cases was 21 percent, today we have 15 percent ”, said L. Ašoklienė.
However, the chief epidemiologist emphasized that while this is an expected change, the numbers are only declining for a week.
“This is only the first week that we see these numbers, therefore we would not like to rejoice in advance, we would like to see longer-term trends and declining numbers,” said L. Ašoklienė.
Lithuania has a stricter quarantine regime until January 31. He closed many stores, hairdressers, restricted the movement of people and meetings.
Author Milena Andrukaitytė
