President Klaus Iohannis had to reassure Romanian people the other day at a news conference that the government will not impose any measures that would separate elderly citizens from their families. The head of state had to make this declaration, as the director of the Matei Balş Epidemiological Institute of Bucharest, Adrian-Streinu Cercel, had come up with a rather austere plan, causing a public outcry.
The institute’s director had proposed that citizens above 65 years of age would be best protected from getting infected with the coronavirus if they were separated and put in quarantine. According to his plan, when social distancing restrictions are finally eased in Romania, people belonging to the 65+ age group should leave their family environments and move to various quarantine locations for a period of 12 weeks.
President Iohannis harshly criticized Cercel’s plan, entitled “The Great Vacation.” As the president said, the whole idea was “an unacceptable aberration, worthy of a totalitarian regime, not a democratic country in the 21st century.”
The director of the epidemiological institute actually outlined four risk groups in his plan. Besides citizens more than 65 years old, he also specified those aged 45-65, people under 30, and those who have chronic conditions – so, basically all of society. Per his plan, citizens between the ages of 40 and 65 should also completely isolate themselves if their work is not considered “essential for the functioning of the country during the circumstances of the pandemic.”
“No one has to be afraid; we live in a free country, and the state will not enforce such totalitarian-like measures. Elderly citizens can rest assured; authorities will not remove them from their homes and put them in quarantine centers. We do not need any such panic-mongering statements; older people will be helped by being properly informed and counseled on how to avoid getting infected,” Iohannis emphasized.
Doctor Cercel is well-known for making unfounded statements; as Mediafax news agency recounted, he came under the spotlight in 2006 and 2009 as well, during the avian influenza and swine flu, because of his questionable remarks and predictions. Moreover, this January, a week after WHO had called together its Emergency Committee over the coronavirus outbreak, Cercel publicly stated that “Romania is not at risk at all, as the focal point of the epidemic is just a small dot on the large map of China.” On February 27, a day after Romania confirmed its first coronavirus infection, Cercel affirmed on a TV show that the virus is ten times weaker than regular influenza, and the pandemic “is the business of medics,” with people worrying about it needlessly.
Title image: The director of the Balş Institute would have placed the elderly in quarantine for 12 weeks
