Is it the end of lockdown for Poland?
As England already started lifting restrictions, Poland went into another big lockdown on March 27 when the 3rd wave of coronavirus hit. At first, the new restrictions were supposed to apply only for two weeks but were quickly stretched until the end of April.
On Wednesday Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki and Health Minister Adam Niedzielski held a live conference where they announced the reopening plan for May. It looks like by the end of the next month Poland will be fully out of lockdown.
The first stage of restarting the economy begins on May 4 as museums, art galleries, malls and elementary schools classes 1-3 will be reopening. On May 8th hotels in Poland will be finally reopened with an occupancy rate of 50%.
However, restaurant, wellness and spa zones in these places will stay closed.
A week later, from May 15, people are going to be able to go out and enjoy their time in the restaurant gardens. And from May 29th the opening of the restaurant under a strict sanitary regime will be possible.
From that day on, it will also be possible to go to the cinema and theater. It is important to mention that from May 15 elementary school classes 4-8 will be reopened and high schools will follow on May 29.
As most people are happy about lifting the restrictions we cannot say the same about students and teachers, as all schools are reopening 4 weeks before the end of the school year. Most people believe that there is not a point in reopening school this close to the end and are afraid that it will only increase Covid-19 cases which would cause a 4th wave.
Headmaster Ewelina Bober of Sport school SMS Rzeszów said “In my opinion reopening schools on May 29 wasn’t the best decision. Schools should have stayed closed as we still have around 8,000 new cases per day. In addiction, the end of the school year is on June 25 and we have to announce final grades on June 10 and there is nothing we can really do in schools after that. I believe that reopening schools for 4 week will bring more harm than good.”
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WNOL 