Norway bins most pandemic curbs

Norway will scrap most of its remaining COVID-19 lockdown measures with immediate effect as an ongoing spike in coronavirus cases is unlikely to jeopardise health services, the prime minister said on Tuesday.

Restaurants will again be allowed to serve alcohol beyond 11 o’clock at night, working from home will no longer be mandatory and the current limit of 10 visitors in private homes is removed, Jonas Gahr Stoere told a news conference.

The announcement follows similar decisions by neighbouring Denmark and other European countries including Britain, Ireland and the Netherlands which have eased or removed restrictions in recent weeks in a bid to restore normality.

Norway in December went into partial lockdown to combat the fast-spreading Omicron COVID variant, but most of those measure are no longer needed, the government said.

“Even if many more people are becoming infected, there are fewer who are hospitalised. We’re well protected by vaccines. This means that we can relax many measures even as infections are rising rapidly,” Stoere said.

The country will keep basic social distancing measures however, asking people to stay at least one metre apart and to wear a face mask in crowded settings, thus still hampering some businesses such as nightclubs and entertainment venues.