A petition for the Government to take urgent preventive measures against the spread of Covid-19 to Malta, was launched on Monday by the Civil Society Network Malta.

In a statement, CSN said that “concretely, the petition is demanding that all flights from the Northern Italian region and other high-risk areas into Malta be cancelled as a matter of urgency.”

CSN argued that, “Malta is playing with fire and with the world on the brink of a pandemic, it is risking hundreds of lives by not having adequate preventative introduced urgently.”

“Many professionals from the health sector have warned the Government that Malta’s healthcare infrastructure is ill-equipped to handle the potential influx of coronavirus cases,” CSN said.

As many European countries are taking strict measures to fight its spread, CSN stated that “the Maltese Government should have already begun thinking first and foremost about the health and security of the Maltese people, before money.”

“Travel to Malta shouldn’t just be limited from Italy, but there should be restrictions on any means of transport from high-risk regions,” it said.

CSN has also supported MAM’s call for harsher sanctions for whoever violates quarantine and, in doing so, endangers the general public.

There is an urgent need for the Government to react now to stop the spread of the virus from Italy, where presently, a quarter of the population has found itself locked in its own country, CSN said.

As Air Malta has temporarily suspended its service to those areas, CSN argued that, so too must other companies be prevented from bringing passengers in for the time being.

CSN concluded by saying that “once more the Government is dragging its feet in the face a problem that is increasingly spreading quicker and quicker.

CSN appealed to the public to sign this petition for the “health and the security of the country.”

File photo

Permalink: CSN petition demanding all flights cancelled from high-risk areas