In the coming three weeks, Czechia expects the first major relaxation of coronavirus measures. The government decided that on Monday, May 3, a large portion of children will return to school, and shops will begin opening a week later on May 10.
The biggest change concerns students. Schoolchildren in the second stage of elementary schools or lower grades of multi-year grammar schools will once again return to classrooms. Classes will follow a system in which groups of children will rotate every week. Children will return to schools in seven out of 14 regions where the epidemiological situation has reached the required level. In the rest of the regions, children will go to school a week later. Until last week, only pupils in the first stage of elementary schools were allowed to get back to their classrooms. Students will have to undergo two Covid-19 tests per week.
Furthermore, services allowing the presence of only two people, such as hairdressers, cosmeticians, or massage parlors, will open on Monday, but will operate under specific conditions, including the requirement that both the service provider and the client have a negative Covid-19 test.
According to Minister of Industry and Trade Karel Havlíček, other services, such as crafts, will open on May 10, along with retail. Havlíček added that stores would open on May 10,regardless of the number of infected people per 100,000 inhabitants, which is the figure the government follows when deciding on the next step.
Other services, including restaurant gardens, must wait until May 17 at the earliest. Their opening will depend on the number of new cases per 100,000 people.
Title image: A young boy undergoes rapid COVID-19 test before entering his class at a kindergarden in Prague, Czech Republic, Monday, April 12, 2021. The Czech government has agreed to start easing the tight lockdown in one of the hardest-hit European countries and has given a green light for at least some children to return to schools. (AP Photo/Petr David Josek)
