June 20, 2020 — Istrian authorities will introduce measures to fight a second coronavirus outbreak, expressing exasperation a the lack of initiative at the national level.
All cities and municipalities in Istria must determine possible accommodations that will be used for the quarantine and self-isolation of tourists with possible coronavirus infections, according to Index.hr.
While most larger hotels can reserve a percentage of capacity for sick guests, not all facilities have the luxury. Istria, which had a 70-day streak without new infections, quickly responded after new cases were announced on Friday.
The coordination of the Civil Protection Directorate of the Istrian County and local elected officials mulled ways to manage possible coronavirus patients during the tourist season. It sent three requests to the National Headquarters to review the border crossing regime for citizens from countries with high COVID-19 infection rates, after Slovenia adopted a 14-day self-isolation measure for such citizens yesterday.
“Given the situation and excellent functioning of the civil protection and health system in Istria, thanks to which extremely good results have been achieved in the past period in the fight against COVID-19, our goal is to maintain these results,” said the Directorate’s head Dino Kozlevac.
He added local officials waited three weeks for instructions from national-level authorities on how to proceed in case of sick tourists. Considering that there are already more than 40,000 tourists in Istria, Kozlevac pointed out that today they decided to make the decision independently.
“We are simply not able to wait any longer and from Tuesday we will have fully prepared and equipped facilities,” Kozlevac said in Pazin, expressing dissatisfaction with lackluster inspection and enforcement of existing epidemiological measures.
These measures, he claims, are quite liberal, “and people have relaxed too much after we did not have more than 70 days of infected people in Istria until yesterday.
“These last two cases have warned us of three key measures, namely physical distance, the use of protective masks, especially indoors, and personal hygiene,” Kozlevac said.
Istria’s Civil Protection Directorate would ask the state to conduct the highest quality inspection in facilities that do not comply with these recommendations, from disinfectants at the entrance to respecting the number of people entering the area. Local authorities will meet with representatives of retail chains on Wednesday.
He also announced that the County Headquarters will adopt certain measures next week, which will be binding and which “will not be restrictive, and there will be no closures.”
Authorities will also ask the national government to shuffle Croatia’s healthcare workers, moving them away from quieter areas to help with the treatment of tourist-filled locales.
“We all want to live together, we want to preserve the health of our citizens, but we want to enable citizens and the economy to function, including tourism,” said the mayor of Pula, Boris Miletić. “However, the relaxation of measures has increased risks for the possibility of transmitting the infection.”
