The nightly curfew in force in Peru for almost two years will end this weekend, according to a decree published this Saturday, which extended the state of emergency due to the covid-19 pandemic for a month.
The government decided to lift the five-hour curfew, estimating that “it was no longer effective”, despite the fact that covid-19 infections in January are heading for one million (almost a third of the total) per the scourge of the third wave and that Lima was placed in a state of emergency to contain crime.
The decision, adopted by the Council of Ministers on Wednesday, was made official in a decree published in the official gazette, and which extends the national state of emergency, declared after the outbreak of the pandemic in Peru, in March 2020 throughout February.
“There will be no more curfew in our country, this is annulled. The measure has health considerations, an evaluation has been made (…) on the impact of the curfew and we are considering suspending it,” Health Minister Hernando Cevallos told Channel N on Wednesday.
“The curfew generated crowds when returning home from work,” he said.
However, the minister warned that dances, social gatherings (even at home), patron saint festivities and all meetings “that involve concentration or agglomeration of people, that put public health at risk” will continue to be prohibited.
The state of emergency makes it possible to restrict the exercise of constitutional rights related to personal liberty and security, the inviolability of the home, and the freedom of assembly and transit.
The national state of emergency, which governs in parallel to the health emergency due to the pandemic, authorizes the military to patrol the streets together with the police during the night curfew.
Peru accumulates more than three million cases of covid-19 and more than 205,000 deaths.
The Andean country, with 33 million inhabitants, has the highest death rate from the pandemic in the world: 6,220 per million inhabitants, according to an AFP balance based on official figures.
On January 21 there was a record of almost 60,000 new infections, but this week they dropped to 42,000 per day on average, which would indicate that the worst phase of the third wave is passing.
