Turkey announced Friday, November 20, that it had recorded 141 deaths linked to the coronavirus in 24 hours, a record in this country, shortly before the entry into force of restrictions intended to stem the spread of the epidemic.
Read also: Covid-19: is France winning economically against Germany, as Geoffroy Roux de Bézieux says?
The new deaths announced by the Ministry of Health brought the number of deaths caused by the pandemic in Turkey to 12,084 out of more than 435,000 officially registered cases.
The previous death record was recorded on April 19 with 127. The latest figures were announced shortly before the entry into force on Friday evening of a series of measures aimed at slowing the progression of the epidemic.
Thus, restaurants and cafes will only be able to offer take-out sales and Turks will not be allowed to go out on weekends between 8:00 p.m. and 10:00 a.m.
In addition, shopping centers, supermarkets and hairdressers will have to cease all activity at 8:00 p.m. from Friday and cinemas will remain closed until the end of the year.
The teaching will also be done remotely until the end of December.
In announcing these restrictions on Tuesday, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan warned that if the epidemic continued to worsen, the government would be "
forced to consider even more painful measures
".
Doctors' organizations claim that the actual number of cases and deaths in Turkey is far higher than reported by the Ministry of Health.
Istanbul mayor Ekrem Imamoglu, an opponent of Erdogan, last week called for confining the particularly affected economic capital of the country.
According to him, the number of people who die every day in Istanbul is higher than that announced daily by the government for the whole country.