Returning migrants are attacking their loved ones, there is no way to stop them

Shortly after eleven o’clock on Thursday morning, a plane landing with compatriots from Great Britain landed at Vilnius airport.

And in the waiting room and airport entrances, relatives, children or other relatives from the farthest corners of Lithuania were also anxiously waiting. And it’s only after the influx of newcomers that the long-awaited hugs in the face of a pandemic begin.

Šiauliai says she is not afraid of anything, when she has a child she is not happy to be able to return home to prepare for the holidays.

Audrius, who returned to Šeduva with his family after a year off, is also not afraid. He says that after a long deliberation on whether to ride or not, but the idea of ​​Christmas with his loved ones led him to a decision. And it has not stopped from the strictest quarantine restrictions in Lithuania.

“It just came to our attention then. Still, you need to visit your parents,” says the emigrant Audrius.

The man is not hiding, he will stay with the family not with his parents, but with his sister, who returned from England in early December. And the woman does not hide that she will still consider how to accept Christmas, with her parents who are sixty years old, or separately, because she is afraid.

“A lot, because dad had heart surgery a couple years ago, he’s still pretty fresh. It is, of course, the family, Christmas, ”says migrant Rita.

And to stop going directly from the airport to parents and relatives, the authorities admit that they found no way. Although emigrants are subject to exactly the same strict quarantine rules as those living separately from their parents in Lithuania.

“We understand those different situations, but it is not possible to regulate every situation in great detail. And we really don’t want to oppose our people. Certainly, it is not possible to put a police officer next to every person who arrives, a person who travels, to get people’s attention. We have a really high level of morbidity, our health system is already breaking down, so let’s be responsible, let’s not go to Lithuania for the moment. Lithuania is currently on fire, “says the Interior Minister. Agnė Bilotaitė.

According to current procedure, migrants, like all compatriots who live here, cannot travel from one municipality to another, they must live in a rented premises or where they have declared property. They must be quarantined after the trip.

It is true that compatriots permanently residing in Lithuania do not hide their indignation that some emigrants do not plan to follow the rules and no one takes care of them:

“Everything was closed, and for those who returned, the stores were closed, which was not agreed.”

“Our state has already made such a mantle here.”

“You will not come to all the policemen, here is the understanding of the person himself. And that people do not think about what he is doing, that is really the case.”

That is why the Prime Minister urges those who are still preparing for a trip to Lithuania to think hard.

“Everything will be like this, but I want to draw attention to a very simple situation, the situation in Lithuania is bad and probably the worst is deteriorating, I urge people to think whether there is a real need to return to Lithuania on vacation, increase the risk to you and your health system, which is already overcrowded, ”said Prime Minister Ingrida Šimonytė.

Doctors are outspoken, migrants risk their own health and that of their loved ones when they return home.

“The risk is, in fact, high, because those who come will bring the infection, because there are outbreaks in many European countries. The UK itself, which has the highest flow of migrants, is experiencing 20,000 new cases a day, ”says Vytautas Kasiulevičius, member of the Council of Health Experts.

According to data from the Interior Ministry, 1,500 people fly to Lithuania every day. For those who ignore neither the respects nor the calls to stay where they now live, the government reminds you – it is necessary to fill out the questionnaires. It would make it easier to control what’s happening and get sick, at least to partially track where the infection was contracted.