Ecuador extends containment imposed due to the pandemic of the new coronavirus until May 3, and then plans to resume activities after seven weeks of shutdown, Minister of the Interior Minister Maria Paula Romo announced Friday .
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"We will end the month of April next week in solitary confinement and start a new stage on Monday May 4, a stage with distancing," she said on national radio and television. Paula Romo added that from this date, Ecuador will experience a "new normal" , according to which "things will be done in a very gradual and very careful manner" to revive activities in the country, which has 22,719 confirmed cases of covid-19, including 576 dead. The government has also reported another 1,060 "probable" deaths from the virus, but unconfirmed due to lack of testing.
Ecuador, with 17.5 million inhabitants, is the second most affected country in Latin America by the pandemic, after the gigantic Brazil and its nearly 49,500 inhabitants. Paula Romo assured that "the peak (of the pandemic) has passed in most of the provinces" , all subject since March 17 to containment, with in particular restrictions on the circulation of vehicles and a 15 hour curfew by day. She added that medical emergencies had decreased, especially in the province of Guayas (southwest) and its capital Guayaquil, where 68% of the cases are concentrated.
"We are not out of the emergency, we are changing phase, stage, instructions," she said without giving details of the rules in effect from May 4. The Minister warned that if the public did not respect the new measures, the government could return to "a state of greater restriction and (...) isolation" .