Mumbai:
The Maharashtra government has imposed a night curfew – from 11 PM to 6 AM till January 5 – for Mumbai and all major cities, in view of the mutated strain of novel coronavirus that has emerged in the United Kingdom over the past few days and caused several nations, including India, to temporarily ban flights to and from that country.
In addition, passengers flying in from other European countries (or any in the Middle East) will be sent to 14-day institutional quarantine, and all others must adhere to a similar period of home quarantine, the state government said late Monday evening.
Earlier today the centre announced a ban on all flights from the UK till December 31.
The ban will start Wednesday and all inbound passengers from the UK before then will be administered RT-PCR tests on arrival. Those who test positive will be sent to institutional quarantine and the rest will be asked to home-isolate for seven days.
Union Health Minister Dr Harsh Vardhan has assured people the government has the situation under control and “there is no need to panic”. Dr Vardhan said Monday: “… don’t get hassled with imaginary situations, imaginary talks and imaginary panic. The government is fully alert.”
The decision to impose a night curfew marks a U-turn by Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray.
On Sunday he said he was against a night curfew although experts had recommended it. However, the Chief Minister did say that face masks would be made mandatory for the next six months.
The mutated version of the coronavirus was first detected in southeast England in September. It is quickly becoming the dominant strain in London and other parts of the UK, and has led to surging infection numbers and toughest levels of restrictions on some 18 million people.
The new strain has worried health experts at a time when several nations, including the UK and the United States, have cleared Covid vaccines to boost their fight amid pandemic. European Union experts believe existing vaccines against coronavirus are effective against the new strain.
Maharashtra’s curfew and flight restrictions hark back to measures from a few months ago, when the virus was rampaging through the state. It remains the worst-affected though, with nearly 19 lakh cases since the crisis broke in December last year.
The active caseload, however, has dropped steadily. Currently there are only around 63,000 active cases. The state has reported around 48,700 deaths linked to the virus.
