Restaurants are legally allowed to be open for selling
take-away food in their licensed hours, and do not have to close at 4.30pm, the
Covid-19 taskforce has said, while extra steps are being taken so cross-border
truck drivers do not mix with the public and returnees face minimal risk of
infection while in quarantine.
Truck drivers will only be allowed to stop at the
already-designated stopping points for refreshment and rest, with police
intensifying enforcement, and Zimbabwean cross-border truck drivers at the end
of a shift or series of shifts and wanting to return home must undergo normal
quarantine procedures for returning residents.
With almost all confirmed infections of Covid-19 being
among returning citizens and residents being found in tests at quarantine
centres, the health authorities will now give the diagnostic PCR test, rather
than just screening tests, on the first day of quarantine to ensure those who
test negative can be quarantined more safely while those found to be infected
can be swiftly isolated.
There had been confusion over when restaurants and
take-aways could operate, with police usually ruling that they must close with
other formal businesses at 4.30pm.
But yesterday Attorney- General Mr Prince Machaya said
restaurants were not covered under the Covid-19 working hours for non-essential
formal businesses, as the law clearly spelt out, since they were providing an
essential service. He was responding to questions raised at the National
Taskforce on Covid-19 press briefing in Harare yesterday.
“The situation regarding restaurants is governed by
Statutory Instrument 83 published on March 28.
“The whole objective of this provision, was to ensure that
there were food outlets open to serve those people considered to be an
essential service under the lockdown order in question, who may need to buy
food at varying hours of the day. And implicit in that provision was that
restaurants can operate within their permitted hours as per their operating
licences,” said Mr Machaya.
He said restaurants were therefore not covered by the hours
introduced under level 2 of the national lockdown for ordinary formal
businesses.
“Those hours do not affect the operations of restaurants
and it is clear that those working hours apply to businesses in the formal
commercial and industrial sector that are not essential service.”
The licensed hours are set by the relevant local authority
and can be the full 24 hours in a day in a few cases.
But restaurants and take-aways are not allowed to let
customers eat on the premises, unless they are hotels serving guests, and are
not allowed to serve alcohol.
Speaking at the same occasion, Information, Publicity and
Broadcasting Services Minister Monica Mutsvangwa said Government has also
tightened enforcement of lockdown provisions especially among truck drivers and
returnees where a huge number of cases were being reported.
“In view of the risk of transmission posed by truckers and
returnees, the following measures have been put in place to reduce the said
risk: The increased enforcement through joint roadblocks in order to flush out
rogue truck drivers so that they are penalised if they are contravening
lockdown regulations and simplified educational materials are to be distributed
to truckers so that they familiarise themselves with regulations guiding their
stay in the country,” said Minister Mutsvangwa.
Some of the regulations in line with SI 93 of 2020 include
truckers stopping at designated stops, subjecting themselves and their goods to
disinfection should they offload here in Zimbabwe.
Every driver, being a citizen of Zimbabwe, shall also be
treated as a returning resident and will be required to go into either
mandatory quarantine or isolation.
All returning citizens and residents will now be given the
diagnostic PCR test for Covid-19 on their first day back in Zimbabwe before
being quarantined, if the test is negative, or isolated, if they are ill, to
minimise the risk of infection within quarantine centres.
Follow-up tests will be conducted during the 21-day
mandatory quarantine period.
The switch from screening tests to diagnostic tests comes
in the wake of the continued rise in infections among returnees, raising
concern that people might be infecting each other in the quarantine facilities.
Speaking to The Herald yesterday, Health and Child Care
Minister Dr Obadiah Moyo said while Government cannot tell if the infections
were happening in quarantine centres or before the returning citizens and
residents were taken into centres, the bulk of cases continue to be imported.
“This means that we have to concentrate on testing in the
quarantine areas at early stages, on day one before people even get to know
each other or mixing within that area. We must be able to distinguish on that
very day that this one is positive and that one is negative so that we know
straight away whether to isolate or quarantine the concerned returnees,” said
Dr Moyo.
Government has already put systems in place to allow for
PCR testing on all returnees as they come in.
Previously, Government was screening returnees on arrival,
using the rapid diagnostic test and temperature checks, but that has not been
helpful in certain diagnosis and splitting the well from the ill.
Dr Moyo said RDT was just for screening, which gives a
general picture of the actual burden, but for diagnosis, it is PCR that is
important.
“So in order for us to be 100 percent certain that there is
no infection or cross infection within the quarantine areas, we must do PCR
testing before the returnees enter the quarantine area,” said Dr Moyo.
The Health ministry will continue liaising with other
Government departments such as the ministries of Public Works and National
Housing, and Public Service, Labour and Social Welfare, to ensure that
conditions were conducive and do not expose returnees to Covid-19.
Commenting on the same issue, Monitoring and Implementation
Committee chairperson in the Inter Ministerial Taskforce on Covid-19, who is
also Minister of Defence and War Veterans Affairs Oppah Muchinguri-Kashiri,
said Government was concerned by the number of returnees escaping from
quarantine facilities.
She said security had been tightened at the facilities.
In a provisional order issued by the High Court last week,
Government was ordered to ensure that returning residents were tested on day 1,
day 8 and day 21 of the quarantine period.
It was also ordered to house returnees in such a manner
that social and physical distancing was maintained and ensure that living
conditions were conducive at all times.
The application was made by the Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human
Rights on behalf of the Zimbabwe Doctors for Human Rights.
Returnees from South Africa and Botswana now form the
overwhelming majority of the 282 Covid-19 infections recorded in Zimbabwe. Herald
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