Tunisia on Tuesday issued a decree for a general lockdown accompanied by a “reinforced curfew” of four days from Thursday, APA can report.
Faced with a second wave which has reached record figures, leading to a “very dangerous” situation, the Tunisian Minister of Health, Faouzi Mehdi, announced a general lockdown from Thursday to Sunday.
The “reinforced curfew” accompanying the lockdown starts at 5 p.m. GMT and ends at 5:00 a.m. GMT.
A curfew was already in force from 7 p.m. to 5 a.m. since October 2020.
Schools, high schools and universities are also closed from January 13 to 24 and all cultural events are prohibited during this period.
According to the Minister of Health, there have been 5,854 confirmed cases of coronavirus infection in schools, including 32 deaths and 4,205 schools affected.
These restrictions measures coming against the backdrop of social tensions come into force on the 10th anniversary of the revolution, which toppled Zine El-Abidine Ben Ali on January 14, 2011.
Tunisia is the third country most affected by the second wave of the pandemic after South Africa (34,334 deaths) and Morocco (7,784 deaths).
The country, which had recorded about fifty deaths during the first wave, has already recorded 5343 deaths and 164,936 cases according to the National Observatory of New and Emerging Diseases.
“The situation is very dangerous and exceeds the capacity to take care of patients,” warned Nissaf Ben Alya, director of the Observatory.
CD/lb/as/APA