KYIV (Reuters) – Ukraine on Wednesday expanded its list of countries from which visitors are not required to go into a 14-day quarantine to help curb the risk of coronavirus transmission.
In recent weeks, Ukraine has recorded consistently high levels of new infections day by day, which health authorities attribute to a reluctance to wear protective masks and observe social distancing.
Ukrainian health authorities have said that the number of coronavirus patients in the country is 62 per 100,000 people.
Until Wednesday, visitors from countries where the number of coronavirus patients exceeded 40 per 100,000 people had to spend two weeks in quarantine in Ukraine, meaning around citizens of some 150 countries could enter without restrictions.
On Wednesday the government raised that threshold to 55 per 100,000, but it was not immediately clear how many more countries would be added to the quarantine-exempt list.
According to the health ministry, Ukraine has recorded a total of 55,607 coronavirus cases, including 1,427 deaths.
(Reporting by Pavel Polityuk; Editing by Mark Heinrich)
