Greece announced additional restrictions to control the spread of Covid-19 in Attica and other parts of the country.
In a state address on Thursday, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis appealed to the public to wear masks and comply with regulations so that stricter coronavirus measures can be averted.
On Friday, Deputy Civil Protection Minister Nikos Hardalias said that, from September 26, all establishments (in Athens and other areas including the islands of Lesbos and Mykonos) that serve food and drinks will now be permitted to open from 5:00am, while no retail outlet will be permitted to operate between midnight and 5:00am, including kiosks, liquor stores and mini-markets. The sole exceptions will be pharmacies and fuel stations.
He also announced that the entire region of Trikala will be placed under a special restrictive regime starting at 5:00 on Saturday morning, with the wearing of masks made mandatory in all outdoor areas, while all previous restrictions will continue to apply.
The minister emphasised the need to stick and faithfully implement the protection measures, exercising self-restraint now to avoid a quarantine later, saying that this was something that applied to all, not the just the areas with high infection rates.
Greece recorded 286 new cases of COVID-19 in the latest 24-hour reporting period, the largest daily spike since the first case was registered in the country in late February.
This raises the total number of cases to 16,913.
2,763 are considered to be related to travel from abroad and 7,028 are related to an already known case.
"At this moment we are at a critical point where we must all realise one thing: if for 14 days we all wear our mask, keep our distance, have our antiseptics, this is the greatest response to any prospect of lockdown. It won't be needed, we will be done with the virus. But it has to be done in an organised way, as the overwhelming majority of Greeks did in the past with great success, in order win this battle also," Hardalias added.
Sixty-three individuals are in ICU. Their median age is 69 years, and 15 of them are women. 87.3% have an underlying condition or are aged 70 years and above.
A total of 197 patients have been discharged from ICUs since the start of the pandemic in Greece.
The country’s pandemic death toll stands at 369. The median age of all was 78 years and 97% of the deceased had an underlying condition and/or age of 70 years or more.
