Uruguayan President Luis Lacalle Pou announced new restrictive measures that will be in place until April 12 to curb the spread of Covid-19.
Public offices will be closed except for essential services and face-to-face learning at all levels of education will also be suspended. Clubs, gyms, amateur sports, public shows, parties and social events will also be suspended and restaurants and bars will close at midnight. The “free shops” on the border with Brazil will also be closed, tax-free shops where Brazilians buy to resell in their cities.
“If free shops are a hub (for risks), then we close them,” the Uruguayan president told a news conference Tuesday night.
Uruguay’s neighbor, Brazil, is one of the countries most affected by the pandemic in the world, with overflowing intensive care units, increasing cases and some depleted essential medical supplies. It has the second highest number of virus and death cases, surpassed only by the United States.
The president also said the number of ICU beds in the country will be increased by 35 additional beds for the private sector, 10 for the military hospital and 84 for the public sector.
“Stay in the bubble, stay with your close family,” Lacalle said.
Uruguay set a record for new cases and deaths on Monday with 2,700 new cases and 19 new deaths. In addition, on Monday the health authorities reported that 24 cases of the Brazilian variant P.1 were detected in the country. The country also set a same-day record for the number of active cases (14,418) and a number of people in the ICU (188).
On Tuesday, the country registered 1,801 new cases of the virus for a total of 86,007 cases since the pandemic began, according to the country’s health ministry. In addition, an additional 16 virus-related deaths were recorded on Tuesday, bringing the total number of victims to 827.
The Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) highlighted an increase in cases in Uruguay at its weekly press conference on Tuesday. PAHO Director Carissa Etienne said Uruguay has reported more than 1,000 cases a day several times in recent weeks “an alarming thing given the size of the country.”
The current population of Uruguay is 3,482,469 on March 24, 2021, according to the Worldometer of the latest United Nations data.