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Norway Returns to Tougher Measures to Slow Omicron Wave

Norway Returns to Tougher Measures to Slow Omicron Wave

Norway’s government unveiled a return to tough containment measures as it grapples with record hospitalizations from a coronavirus outbreak that’s set to intensify. 

A recent wave of infections of the delta variant is filling up hospitals, and an out-of-control spread of the omicron strain threatens to overwhelm the health system, prompting the government to unveil a swathe of containment measures.

Norway will stop the sale of alcohol in restaurants and bars, bring back limits on schools and require people to work from home, the government said late on Monday. It will mandate face masks at indoor events, close amusement parks and expand quarantine rules to all suspected virus variants. Adults are advised to cancel sport and leisure activities, and limit social interaction to ease pressure on the health system.

“It is a heavy burden that we are announcing now, for many people and many companies,” Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Store told reporters in Oslo. “For many, this will be experienced as a lock down -- if not of society, then of their lives and livelihoods.”

On Tuesday, the government said it would extend support mechanisms available to businesses to February and reintroduce guarantees for corporate loans.

The Nordic country has been among the most successful in weathering the pandemic during the past year, but has recently been hit by a surge in delta cases, and omicron infections look to be spiraling out of control.

Even if the omicron variant were to cause less serious illness, the sheer scale of the spread would lead to significantly more admissions than today, with as many as 90,000 to 300,000 cases a day in one scenario, the Norwegian Institute of Public Health said. Norway currently reports a few thousand cases a day.

Norway Authority Urges Tightening to Deal With Omicron Dominance

The government also aims to administer a third vaccination dose to all those over 45 by mid-January with the help of the military and pharmacists.

©2021 Bloomberg L.P.