M’laya to impose COVID-19 restrictions from January 5

SHILLONG, JAN 3: Meghalaya government on Monday decided to regulate entry of people from outside into the state while also imposing certain other restrictions from January 5, to prevent outbreak of the Omicron variant of the COVID-19.

After chairing the review meeting on the COVID-19 scenario, Chief Minister Conrad K Sangma said, “Keeping in mind the economic activities of the people and with a mind of ensuring that we impact the economic activities to the bare minimum, the government has decided to come up with some restrictions in the next few days in the state of Meghalaya.”

“(Regarding) entry into Meghalaya apart from the double vaccination you will be requiring a 72 hours certificate of COVID test and if not you will be tested at the entry points,” he said.

He said this is being done to ensure there is absolutely care taken while the people are entering the state to ensure they are fully vaccinated and that they should be tested in 72 hours or they will be tested at the entry point.

Sangma informed that gatherings will not be allowed, movement of vehicles will be restricted and night curfews will also be imposed in the state.

“All these restrictions will start from January 5,” he said while adding that there will be few more restrictions which will be issued by the state government

He however said that only certain gatherings for certain purposes with restricted numbers will be allowed because gatherings is one of the main areas where the spread takes place.

“We feel that while we don’t have a single case, maybe this is the right time to put some restrictions without affecting the public economically. Therefore, the gatherings will be restricted,” he said.

“We will see some form of restrictions on private vehicles coming up. It will be different in different regions/different districts but in Shillong city and most of East Khasi Hills, we will have odd-even system coming up,” he also said adding “We will be having curfews which will start at 10 pm at Shillong city and in other districts, the respective deputy commissioners will accordingly take the decision.”

The chief minister said the decision has been taken in view of the fact that the Omicron variant is spreading very fast throughout the country.

According to him, there are hardly seven or eight states which have not reported any case yet and Meghalaya is one of them and North East as a whole, only one state has reported one or two cases but the speed at which it is traveling and transmitting is very alarming.

Stating that though most of the reports coming in from everywhere are showing that the hospitalization rate and death rate is far lesser compared to the Delta variant, he said but the positivity and the overall transmissibility is very high.

“It is a matter of time (for the government to be prepared) before the Omicron variant will hit Meghalaya state also, which is inevitable,” he asserted.

The chief minister also assured that the state is far better prepared compared to what it was before the second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Though the Delta variant or the second wave have given us a lot of push and a lot of infrastructures and arrangements and different investments were made, we as a government still feels that it is very important for citizens and the government to take precautions and though this last one year has been very difficult for all of us, we still need to be very careful in the coming days.”

“Though the hospitalization rate will be much lower – that’s what the datas shows in other countries and other parts of the world – but as I said if the numbers are very large and if we have four or five lakh people who are infected, even one per cent of hospitalization becomes a very large number. so we need to keep in mind to keep the numbers low,” he added.

The chief minister also urged all the citizens to follow COVID-19 protocols.

“Now that the festive season is over it is important that we put up our guards again and we need to ensure we don’t let our guards down and ensure we follow appropriate protocols and behavior. Please take this seriously as if we are able to control things in the next few weeks then we will be in a much better position compared to other parts of the world and the country also,” he said.

By Our Reporter