Ireland goes back on lockdown for 6 weeks
DUBLIN – Ireland is already focused on Christmas. It’s a major national priority.
Unless the country can get the COVID-19 pandemic under control, there won’t be much Christmas cheer this year in Galway, Cork or Dublin.
With infections on the rise, the government has imposed a tough newlockdown that began at midnight Wednesday, shutting down nonessential shops, limiting restaurants to takeout service and ordering people to stay within 3 miles of their homes for the next six weeks.
The restrictions are among the toughest in Europe, and PrimeMinister Micheal Martin said he imposed them in part to ensure Ireland can celebrate Christmas “in a meaningful way.”
That message has won the support of many business owners, even in the hard-hit hospitality industry, which was still recovering fromanearlier lockdown that slashed revenue and triggered layoffs in the spring.
Paul Cadden, owner of the Saba Restaurant Group, will have to lay off 20 people, but will do takeaway, hampers, anything necessary, to get by until lockdown ends. He hopes the new restrictions will bring the virus under control in time for the all-important holiday season.
“Nobody wants to be closed, but for the greater good, you know,” Cadden told The Associated Press. “If everybody takes it seriously and, you know, we all lock down and do what we’re told, hopefullywe can get a run into the December period.”
Ireland has had little success in slowing the spread of COVID-19 in recentweeks, even as it has slowly ratcheted up restrictions on social and business interactions. The infection rate stood at 279 cases per 100,000 people in the 14 days through Tuesday, compared with 96 per 100,000 in the period through Sept. 30.
With a population of about 5million, Ireland has recorded 1,865 deaths related to COVID-19.
In announcing that he was moving the entire country into the highest level of restrictions in the government’s fivetier strategy, Martin appealed for optimism at a time many have experienced loss.
“The days are getting shorter and colder, but I ask you to remember this: Even as the winter comes in, there is hope and there is light,” he told the nation on Monday night.
“It won’t be the same Christmas that we’ve enjoyed in years past, but ifwe all pull together and follow the spirit of these new rules, it will be a very special time and will give us all some respite from the hardship of the last seven months.”
But the measure also makes economic sense to some business owners because it has the potential to save the Christmas season.
Cadden, a past president of the Restaurants Association of Ireland, said that between corporate events and family gatherings, Christmas can account for40% of the annual revenue for some establishments.
Sean Collender, co-owner of theKinara chain of Pakistani restaurants, supports the new measures but says the government needs a long-term strategy to prevent a series of lockdowns and reopenings that will be hard on workers and force some businesses to close permanently.
“The government need to come up with a plan, because if we’re just shutting to reopen to shut to reopen to shut we have a major problem ahead for all our businesses,” he said.