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Poland Imposes Full Border Controls, Quarantines for Visitors

Poland Imposes Full Border Controls, Quarantines for Visitors

(Bloomberg) -- Poland implemented full checks at its border crossings for at least the next 10 days in an attempt to better contain the coronavirus outbreak.

Premier Mateusz Morawiecki said on Friday that the government would quarantine Polish nationals as well as foreigners crossing into the country, while allowing trade to continue. The country is part of the European Union’s Schengen zone which allows for free travel of goods and people.

“In the current situation, we can’t allow ourselves to keep open borders for foreigners,” Morawiecki told reporters in Warsaw. “We want to reduce risks as much as it’s possible to do in Poland.”

He also announced new curbs on public gatherings, which are now limited to no more than 50 people. Restaurants, clubs and bars will only be available for take-out orders. International flights and trains will be suspended from Sunday and Poland will shut shopping centers.

Interior Minister Mariusz Kaminski said this isn’t the right time for foreigners to travel to Poland but those who arrive will be able to move around the country after a quarantine.

Earlier Friday, Poland’s central bank said it has “significant cash resources” in its branches seeking to calm concern over availability of zloty notes and coins in some parts of the country. The nation has 68 confirmed cases of coronavirus and one death from the disease.

A decree on the national health threat, announced on Thursday, allows the government to set temporary restrictions on travel, limit operations of companies and further restrict public gatherings. Poland has already shut schools and universities while banning mass events and imposing sanitary controls on borders.

To contact the reporter on this story: Marek Strzelecki in Warsaw at mstrzelecki1@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Andrea Dudik at adudik@bloomberg.net, Wojciech Moskwa, Michael Winfrey

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