State of alert will be maintained “as long as necessary,” Romanian PM says

The state of alert will be maintained for "as long as necessary" in Romania, namely as long as the country registers high rates of coronavirus infections, prime minister Ludovic Orban said on Sunday evening, June 21.

"As long as the virus spread in society remains at a high level, the state of alert is necessary; it is the case that allows the authorities, but also citizens, institutions, companies to apply all the rules needed to protect the health of Romanians," Orban said, according to News.ro.

He also said that "many public, political figures" have been acting "irresponsibly," telling the Romanians not to follow the rules set by the authorities.

The prime minister also denied the rumors according to which the authorities have been manipulating data related to the number of coronavirus-related infections and deaths in Romania. "We don't manipulate any numbers. We have several accredited laboratories, and these laboratories perform the tests, these tests are done according to a methodology, there is a centralized system. No one can manipulate such information," Orban explained.

According to him, "the systematic trivialization of the danger, the systematic instigation to disobey the rules has very dangerous consequences."

The Romanian government decided on June 17 to prolong the state of alert for another 30 days.

Raed Arafat, the head of the Department for Emergency Situations (DSU), also said that the epidemiological situation might force the Romanian authorities to defer the next relaxation stage. He explained that there is a rising concern about the evolution of the number of infections, given that, in the second stage of relaxation, people no longer follow the rules as they did in the first phase.

Romania reported 315 new daily cases of infection with COVID-19 on Sunday, June 21. It was the fifth consecutive day with more than 300 new cases confirmed in 24 hours.

(Photo source: Gov.ro)