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The Irish government announced a $ 19 million support package to help pubs, bars and nightclubs, which remain closed indefinitely, according to a statement from the Irish Department of Business released on Friday.
The support package will offer “restart grants” of between $ 6,700 and $ 41,700 to help businesses reopen when the time comes, and the government will also waive certain pub license fees for 2020.
“It’s been a really tough few months for bar owners,” said Irish Deputy Prime Minister Leo Varadkar. “Our publicans are making a massive sacrifice to protect their communities and the government is determined to help.”
On Thursday, Irish health authorities announced that “wet” pubs and bars, which do not serve food along with alcohol, would be closed indefinitely due to the increasing number of cases in hospitals.
That is the third delayed reopening of pubs, bars and nightclubs, which were initially scheduled to reopen in July, which was canceled to August 10 and finally to August 31. Meanwhile, pubs that also serve food were able to reopen at the end of June.
“Our focus should be on reducing the number of cases, controlling the spread of this disease, and we will keep the reopening of pubs, along with other measures that could be alleviated, under review in the coming weeks,” he said. Dr Ronan Glynn, Acting Medical Director for the Irish Department of Health, during a briefing on Thursday.
Ireland recorded 127 new confirmed cases of Covid-19 on Friday and 93 new confirmed cases on Thursday, according to the latest data from the Department of Health.
“Cases, while not increasing rapidly, are continuing to increase,” Glynn said Thursday. “If we continue down that path for an extended period, we will see more hospitalizations, we will see more people in critical care and it will have knock-on effects for many parts of our society and our economy,” he added.
“We are not contemplating a national lockdown as things are currently. We certainly hope that we will not return to a situation like that, but ultimately the power to prevent it is in our hands as individuals for the next few weeks.” “he added.
In a video message posted to Twitter on Friday, Irish Prime Minister Micheál Martin said: “Our core values will ensure that we continue to suppress COVID-19 to allow our economic, social and cultural life to safely recover and flourish in the future, “he added. .
