COVID-19 Update (July 10-13)

Tigran Avinyan, the Warden of the Special Commission, presented the Government’s decision to extend the State of Emergency (SOE) for another 30 days. According to that decision, the SOE will be in force until August 12, at 5 p.m.
Avinyan briefly spoke about the situation in the northeastern Tavush region and stressed that the provocations and diversion attempts by the Azerbaijani side are impermissible especially at a time when the COVID-19 pandemic keeps spreading in the world. He went on to say that the political leadership of Azerbaijan is the only one responsible for the losses of the Azerbaijani side, escalation of the situation in the region and overall instability. In the meantime, the Armenian Armed Forces stand firmly at their posts, continue performing their duties and effectively suppressing any provocative action. Avinyan urged the public to show maximum responsibility, considering the information warfare that is currently taking place, read and share information from official sources only.

Speaking about the Government’s decision to extend the SOE for the fourth time, Avinyan noted that it should be a sign for everyone to take the situation more seriously and a reason to evaluate our collective behaviour and draw conclusions. The risks for declaring a State of Emergency have not been eliminated and the COVID-19 situation in the country remains concerning but manageable from a healthcare perspective. But without the legal regime of the SOE, it would be challenging for the Government to monitor citizens’ compliance with the existing sanitary rules and regulations. Avinyan said that the Government hopes that there will not be a need to further extend the SOE but they are currently working on legislation in case of a different scenario.
Avinyan reminded that since the outbreak of coronavirus, Armenia has registered 31,151 cases of COVID-19, of which 11,530 are active cases, 19,865 have already recovered, and 573 have died. As of July 12, 546 patients are in critical condition, 111 in extremely critical and 43 are on ventilators. Over 10,000 patients are receiving treatment in their homes. Avinyan also said that with the efforts of the Special Commission and the Foreign Ministry, over 8,000 citizens of Armenia were transferred to Armenia from different parts of the world since March 15. The transfer of about 2,200 of them was organized for free. Overall, 40,000 Armenians returned to Armenia since the outbreak.

As the COVID-19 pandemic continued spreading, Armenia’s healthcare sector kept increasing its capacity to ensure that all those in need of treatment were hospitalized. Since March, over 2,500 hospital beds were allocated for the treatment of COVID-19 patients, 300 of which were ICU beds. Currently, coronavirus patients are being treated in 19 medical centers across Armenia (seven in the regions and twelve in the capital Yerevan). Training of healthcare workers was also a part of the Government efforts to expand the capacity of the healthcare sector. Since the outbreak, over 5,680 medical personnel have participated in trainings to improve their skills in treating COVID-19 patients. Another 2,270 medics participated in more specialized international and local webinars. As of July 6, 46 nurses, epidemiologists, anesthesiologists and ICU specialists arrived in Armenia from abroad to assist their Armenian colleagues in the fight against coronavirus (one from Germany, eighteen from France, five from Russia, eleven from Lithuania and another eleven medics from Italy).

Speaking about the country’s testing capacity, Avinyan noted that when COVID-19 first started spreading Armenia was equipped to conduct up to 300 tests daily. In May, this number grew to 1,000 tests daily and since June when the healthcare sector was sufficiently extended, between 2,000 and 2,800 tests are conducted daily. To date, 135,687 tests have been conducted. Avinyan noted that the locally produced PCR tests were a major factor in expanding the country’s testing capacity. Armenia’s Institute of Molecular Biology has already produced over 8,000 PCR tests, which were already transferred to the Health Ministry’s Center for Disease Control and Prevention. At this point, it is expected that the Institute will produce about 100,000 PCR tests. Four special flights were organized from China to transfer medical supplies and equipment needed for the fight against the coronavirus, including ventilators, oxygen supply stations and concentrators, diagnostic tests, and personal protective equipment.

Avinyan stressed that the fight against the pandemic cannot be effective only with the efforts of the healthcare sector and that the compliance with the anti-epidemic guidelines plays a critical role. He went on to say that the Government’s decision to require citizens to wear face masks a few weeks ago, was based on the scientific evidence available at that point. Now, there are many studies confirming the efficiency of face masks in protecting people from being infected or spreading the virus. Avinyan stressed that public discipline and compliance with the rules is still not satisfactory and police reports about the violations of the anti-epidemic guidelines is one indicator of that. To date, police have filed over 81,000 reports on administrative violations for not wearing a face mask or failure to have an ID when outside. Inspection bodies continue conducting regular monitoring to ensure the compliance of business entities with the sanitary and anti-epidemic rules. Avinyan noted that based on the number of reports filed by inspection officers, it is possible to claim that business entities mostly comply with the set rules. To date, 48,595 reports of administrative violations were filed against business entities and the activities of 4,372 were restricted based on those reports. But the number of violations registered per day has decreased. For example, 58 reports were filed on July 9, while exactly a month ago the number of filed reports was 149.

Avinyan also spoke about the Government’s strategy moving forward and noted that based on the analysis of a group of researchers assisting the Special Commission, as of June 28 the reproduction rate of the virus is 0.8 and continues decreasing. [The reproduction rate of the virus is the expected number of cases directly generated by one case in a population.] According to researchers, some of the requirements introduced by the Government helped to achieve this number. If the Government maintains this tendency, then by the beginning of September the number of confirmed cases per day will be about 140.

As the COVID-19 situation in the country keeps developing, the Government is altering its strategy and considering different scenarios. Although the current strategic approach is based on co-existence and decreasing the spread of the virus by following the set rules, alternative solutions, such as strictly restricting people’s movement, are also being considered. Avinyan noted that when the reproduction rate of the virus was above 1, the Special Commission seriously considered introducing a curfew and stricter rules. The scenario that the Government considered, at some point, was to introduce restrictions for a 10-week-long period, and it was expected that within the mentioned period there would be restrictions on certain forms of economic activity and inter-regional movement. According to the discussed scenario, during weekends all forms of economic activities and all forms of movement would be forbidden. Avinyan, noted that implementing such restrictions for a 10-week-long period would have significantly reduced the reproduction rate of the virus and ensured that Armenia has only a few dozen new confirmed cases per day. Implementation of this scenario, however, would have had devastating consequences for Armenia’s economy (the estimated impact was expected to be equal to 0.8% of Armenia’s GDP).
Avinyan explained that considering the devastating economic consequences of this scenario and that Armenia’s healthcare sector managed to sufficiently expand its capacity, were among the major reasons that allowed the Government to not implement this scenario. He went on to say that nothing can be ruled out and if the healthcare sector is no longer able to provide adequate treatment to all those who need it, the Government will reconsider the implementation of such scenarios. Avinyan called on citizens to follow the rules because it is only with their help that the Government will be able to overcome the pandemic.

The Ministry of Health reported 557 new cases of COVID-19 and 709 recoveries, bringing the total number of confirmed cases to 30,903 of which 11,471 are active cases and 18,709 have already recovered. Eleven COVID-19 patients (the youngest aged 51 and the oldest 93), who all had pre-existing health conditions, died bringing the total number of deaths to 546. Seven other patients with COVID-19 also died, but the virus was not the cause of death; 177 such cases have been reported. To date, 131,216 tests have been conducted, of which 2,050 were in the last 24 hours.