BOGOT, Colombia – Airports, bus terminals and gymnasiums reopened on Tuesday in much of Colombia as the South American country attempts to revive its economy after months of restrictions on the coronavirus pandemic.
This step expanded into previous movements that allowed stores, structure sites, food shopping and factories to resume operations in June in major cities across the country.
Hospital occupation rates and deaths from the new coronavirus have stabilized in much of Colombia over the past 10 days, which has led the national government to take additional emergency measures that have been in force for five months, adding a maximum ban on others traveling inland.Country.
Bogota’s El Dorado Airport has been open to domestic passengers for the first time since March, and long queues have shaped the outside of the country’s bus terminals.
“I’m going to see my family. Too long have passed,” said Sara Rivas, a university student who arrived at Bogota bus station with a backpack and 3 giant suitcases.
Rivas lost his part-time job at a workplace fountain store two months ago, but was unable to leave the Colombian capital due to internal restrictions.
Authorities said foreign flights are expected to resume by the end of this month and that land borders can open in October, as the country enters a new phase of the pandemic, which will allow maximum opening of corporations, but will have to put physical security protocols into force.
“We will not go back to things as they were before (of the pandemic),” President Ivan Duque said on a national television screen monday night.”No one can let our guard down and we’ll have to protect each other.””
Starting with Tuesday’s reopening, municipal governments will be able to impose more restrictions on companies on their territory.
Bogota mayor Claudia Lopez announced that restaurants in the capital will be able to resume service starting Thursday, but will only operate at 25% of their capacity.He also said his administration would shut down parts of a hundred streets around the city from Thursday to Sunday so restaurants can serve more consumers through strikes outside.
“Our priority is to create jobs,” Lopez said.”To do this, we’ll have to take the cars away.”
Colombia’s unemployment rate has doubled to 20% since the outbreak of the pandemic, and the central bank says the economy fell 19% in the quarter amid the blockade.
Despite the stabilization of infections, coronavirus is still spreading in Colombia and experts have warned that contagion could resume when the country restarts its economy.
In the last week of August, Colombia reported that more than 8,000 cases of viruses consistent with the day, compared to the record of 13,000 cases on August 19.Daily deaths peaked at 400 on August 22, and the number fell to around 300.
Colombia has the seventh largest place of cases shown in the world, with more than 610,000.Nearly 20,000 other people have died from COVID-19 in this South American country.
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