VALLETTA (MALTA) (ITALPRESS/MNA) – Malta saw its largest protest against the new anti-Covid regulations announced last week by the Maltese health authorities which will come into force from tomorrow.
As from Monday, fully vaccinated people will no longer need to wear a mask alone in public or when in the company of another person. Although, the Maltese government is not considering to make the vaccination obligatory, social distancing in restaurants, bars and similar venues will return to pre-pandemic levels. However, such venues will only be accessible to people with a valid vaccine certificate, which must include a booster jab.
Hundreds of protesters took to the streets of Valletta protesting opposing the presentation of an updated vaccination certificate including the booster shot to enter most of the public venues. The protestors declared that such regulation is discriminatory and should not be obligatory.
The Nationalist Opposition described the government’s measures as “excessive and discriminatory” and “no longer strike the right balance between public health and peoplès freedoms.”
However, Prime Minister Robert Abela denied that the government is breaching privacy by restricting access to a number of venues to vaccinated people. Abela called on to the anti-vaxxers to take the booster dose. He added the more people are vaccinated, the fewer restrictive measures will be needed. The health authorities have also confirmed that 1,168,755 vaccine doses have been administered to date, of which 305,549 are booster doses.
Over the past 24 hours, two more patients lost their life due to the pandemic – a 77-year-old woman and a 75-year-old man. Since th start of the pandemic, 506 people died while Covid positive. At the moment 104 patients are currently in hospital, of whom eight are in intensive care.
However, Malta registered the lowest number of positive cases in almost a month; with 301 people confirmed positive while 1,133 recovered from the virus. The number of active cases stands at 9,920.
(ITALPRESS).
