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Coronavirus pandemic

Russia’s coronavirus spread rate plunges to all-time low over pandemic period

None of ten regions with the largest number of COVID-19 cases showed the coronavirus spread rate above 1

© Sergei Karpukhin/TASS

MOSCOW, March 11. /TASS/. Russia’s coronavirus spread rate fell to 0.86 in the past twenty-four hours, registering an all-time low over the entire pandemic period, according to TASS estimates based on the anti-coronavirus crisis center’s data released on Thursday.

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None of ten Russian regions with the largest number of COVID-19 cases showed the coronavirus spread rate above 1. In Moscow, it fell to 0.67, the lowest level since January 22, the latest estimates show.

In the Moscow Region, the coronavirus spread rate declined to 0.65, registering the lowest level since the start of the pandemic whereas on Tuesday this rate stayed above 1, the latest data show.

In the other regions with the largest number of COVID-19 cases, the coronavirus spread rate is considerably higher. It equals 1 in the Irkutsk Region, 0.98 in the Nizhny Novgorod Region and St. Petersburg, 0.95 in the Arkhangelsk and Rostov Regions, 0.94 in the Sverdlovsk and Krasnoyarsk Regions and 0.93 in the Voronezh Region, the estimates show.

The coronavirus spread rate shows the number of people one patient can infect before being isolated. Along with other criteria, it was used to define the regions’ readiness for a step-by-step removal of restrictions introduced last spring to combat the epidemic. Now this rate is used to adopt decisions on resuming regular passenger service with foreign countries.

In accordance with the Federal Service for Surveillance of Consumer Rights Protection and Human Wellbeing’s recommendations, the borders with a country may be opened if the coronavirus spread rate does not exceed 1 for a week.

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