By: P.T., STA
Prime Minister Janez Janša indicated in an interview Tuesday that some of the restrictive measures may remain in place until Christmas, but he was hopeful they will not have to be as strict.
“It is already certain that notwithstanding the speed of production of vaccines, immunisation will not make enough of a difference by the end of the year to allow us to relax all measures.
“Some of the measures will definitely be in place then. We hope they will not be as strict,” he said in an interview for Planet TV when asked what kind of Christmas celebration people may expect.
The statement comes a day after Slovenia tightened existing measures, including by closing all non-essential stores and suspending public transportation. The government also decided to extend the formal declaration of the epidemic by a month, until mid-December.
Janša made a renewed appeal to all Slovenians to heed restrictions which he said saved lives. “You cannot stop the virus with a law or a measure, we can only stop it with reason and solidarity.”
He was hopeful that with the latest number of fatalities, the people will “sober up”, while noting that there is no European country in which the second wave of the epidemic would be milder than the first.
Health Minister Tomaž Gantar said today that the measures will not necessarily depend on there being a formal epidemic declared. He thinks that some measures might be cautiously relaxed in two weeks allowing certain services to reopen.