Mexico begins lifting Covid-19 lockdown despite fears worst is still to come
About 300 localities without confirmed virus cases are allowed to resume economic activities, but Amlo warns to maintain discipline.
Local authorities across Mexico have resisted President Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s call to lift emergency coronavirus measures in municipalities without confirmed Covid-19 cases, warning that the pandemic is far from over.
Mexico has registered nearly 50,000 Covid-19 cases and more than 5,000 deaths, and its testing rate ranks among the lowest in Latin America, with just 0.4 tests per 1,000 people.
But on Monday, approximately 300 municipalities throughout the country – called “municipalities of hope” – were given the green light to restart economic activities and lift sheltering-in-place recommendations. Similar measures are scheduled to start 1 June in the rest of the country, while classes will resume the same day.
“We need to maintain discipline, not relax this discipline since we’re almost there,” said López Obrador, commonly called Amlo. “I have a lot of faith and many expectations that we’re going to finish taming this pandemic.”
The decision to resume comes amid questions over the Amlo administration’s coronavirus response, which has depended heavily on disease modeling and involved little testing and no contact tracing.