Crisis staff source reveals: this is the date the cafe working hours change

As of February 15, cafes, restaurants, shopping centers, gyms, sports balloons for recreation and the like. will run until 10pm instead of nowTwo hours less, the Serbian Telegraph has learned.

In addition, night transport will begin, it is still being considered whether in its full scope. Grocery stores will most likely run until 11pm

However, larger indoor and outdoor public gatherings will continue to be prohibited. This also refers to football matches, including the one to be played by Zvezda and Milan on February 18 at the “Rajko Mitic” stadium. If something does not change, UEFA’s decision to allow the opening of 30% of the stadium’s capacity for fans will not affect it either.

According to a source from the Crisis Staff, a part of the doctors opposes any relaxation of the measures, but in the end, they will also have to respect the arguments of the others.

– It is no secret that there is strong pressure from catering companies and the Serbian Chamber of Commerce, just as it is no secret that those two hours cannot change anything important in terms of the number of people infected. It was also demonstrated when the working day was extended to 20 hours. Nothing dramatic happened. On the contrary, the numbers continued to fall or stagnate. In addition, more and more people have been vaccinated and, more importantly, revaccinated, explains the source from the Serbian Telegraph.

However, as you point out, there is one factor that could possibly turn things around:

– These are new strains that are threatening and for which we are not sure in which direction they will spread and how the vaccines will react. That is the only thing that worries us and that could prevent a partial relaxation of the measures.

The findings in our article were confirmed to some extent yesterday by epidemiologist Predrag Kon, a member of the crisis staff. He said it is unrealistic to talk about easing the measures until mid-February, because the level of virus activity is still high and he cannot say anything in advance.

– I am still very skeptical because there is no reduction in the number of new infected. Certainly, the criterion will be softer when it comes to expanding the work of the catering facilities than that of mitigating the ban on public gatherings, which requires a serious reduction in virus activity – explains Dr. Kon.

Let us remind you, last Friday a catering meeting was held at PKS with the Speaker of the Chamber, Marko Čadež, and the Deputy Mayor of Belgrade, Goran Vesić, who strongly supported your requests.

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