With Greece in a lockdown since last November and cases having decreased, everyone's question is when quarantine will end and COVID-19 measures lifted.
The president of the Athens-Piraeus hospital doctors, Matina Pagoni, expressing her personal opinion, believes that this should be done at the beginning of the summer.
The second wave of COVID-19 put Thessaloniki and Serres in lockdown on November 3, and the rest of Greece on November 7.
Although the number of COVID-19 cases may have decreased significantly and the days of reaching almost 4,000 daily cases may be behind us, experts and the government are particularly concerned about two factors:
- the asymptomatic, and
- patients treated in the Intensive Care Unit
The number of reductions is slow and not to the extent that they would like.
Epidemiologists believe that the Christmas and New Year holidays will bring an increase of COVID-19 cases at a time when the big bet is not to put new pressure on the health system.
The government's back-and-forth on the opening of retail with the click away system and the eventual opening of only primary schools and not secondary education, shows that scientists are constantly ringing the alarm bell to the government.
They especially point out the expected dangers of a lifting the lockdown that could lead to a third wave.
But when can we hope for the lockdown to be lifted and a return to normalcy, even with some restrictive measures?
For the president of the Athens-Piraeus Hospital Doctors Association, Matina Pagoni, this requires a daily evaluation of the parameters set by the experts regarding the pandemic.
However, her personal opinion is that we still have a long way to go before we say goodbye to quarantine.
"We cannot say when the restrictive measures will be lifted if the parameters we have are not evaluated daily. No one can say until when it will be valid," said Pagoni.
She adding her personal opinion that "the removal of the lockdown can be done when 70% of the population is vaccinated, ie around June, to have a relative immunity, and then slowly have measures reduced."
