Prime Minister Fiame Naomi Mata’afa has announced changes to the State of Emergency Orders that come into effect from 6pm today (local time).
“After careful consideration of our current situation with regard to the revised Alert Levels matrix and the progressive achievement of our vaccination rates, Cabinet has decided to move our SOE Orders to Alert Level 1, colour coded Yellow,” Fiame said this afternoon.
Some of the main conditions that will now apply under Level 1 include:
- Opening of all schools
- Allowing public gatherings
- Extended opening hours for markets, supermarkets, small stores, petrol stations and pharmacies
- Extended opening hours for restaurants
- Opening of bars and night clubs between
- All local travel by sea and land are open
- All overseas travel are subject to Cabinet endorsement
- Free movement of children under 12 years in public places
The country was at Alert Level 2 for the past two weeks due to Covid-19 cases.
Fiame said 139 of the frontline workers that were quarantined were released this week, following a total of 7 tests, which all returned negative.
“The 48 passengers that never tested positive have been released. The number of people that had been affected remains at 31, some have fully recovered and returned negative tests with subsequent release while others are close to making full recovery. All remain asymptomatic.”
Fiame said that there is no evidence of community transmission.
A total of 145,077 people or 98.5 per cent of the eligible population have received their first dose of the Covid-19 vaccine.
Eighty-nine per cent or 129,200 people are fully vaccinated
For children between the ages of 12 to 17 year olds, 89.3 per cent have received their first dose and 73 per cent are fully vaccinated.
Overall 96.8 per cent of the eligible population have received their first dose and 86.3 per cent are fully vaccinated.
Fiame said a total of 2,012 booster injections have been done to date for 1,043 females and 969 males.
“The vaccines roll out programme for the age group 5-12 will begin as soon as the paediatric vaccine supplies arrive.”
The Prime Minister said Samoa is on target to achieve its vaccination rates.
Photo Government of Samoa screenshot Caption: Prime Minister Fiame Naomi Mata'afa announces changes to the SOE Orders