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41 new COVID cases confirmed in Armenia, government orders to close cafes, restaurants

More than 700 people are quarantined

YEREVAN, March 23. /TASS/. Forty-one new COVID-2019 cases have been confirmed in Armenia over the day, with an overall number of coronavirus patients reaching 235, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said on Monday.

"I have extremely alarming news. Forty-one new coronavirus cases have been confirmed in the past day. The overall number of such cases is 235. We will have to toughen the emergency regime for a span of one week," he said in an address telecast on his Facebook account.

He also said that the government had decided to close all cafes and restaurants in a bid to prevent further spread of the infection.

"The geography of the infection is alarming. To stop further spread of the disease, we have taken a decision to close all cafes and restaurants and to suspend construction works and operation of textile factories for a span of one week," he said.

According to Pashinyan, 26 patients have pneumonia and are in stable conditions. More than 700 people are quarantined.

A pneumonia outbreak caused by the COVID-19 virus (previously known as 2019-nCoV) was reported in China’s city of Wuhan, a large trade and industrial center with a population of 12 million, in late December 2019. Cases of the new coronavirus have also been reported from more than 150 countries and territories, including Russia, which by now has 438 cases, with 17 patients having recovered. The World Health Organization says that the novel coronavirus cases across the globe have exceeded 330,000, with more than 15,000 deaths. The World Health Organization (WHO) has officially described the situation with the novel coronavirus as a pandemic.