Additional Decisions To Curb The Spread Of Coronavirus

H E Lolwah bint Rashid bin Mohammed Al Khater, Assistant Foreign Minister and Spokesperson of the Supreme Committee for Crisis Management spoke in a conference on 1st April 2020, saying that it was decided to extend the decision to suspend incoming flights to Doha, with the exception of transit and air cargo, to combat the spread of coronavirus in Qatar.

Qataris and children of Qataris, and their wives and permanent residency owners can come at any time they want but should go first to health quarantine for 14 days. “Also before coming to Qatar, they should notify Qatar’s embassies 72 hours ago in the countries from which they are coming so that necessary arrangements can be made.” she elaborated in the conference.

She said that in order to preserve the safety of the closed part of the Industrial Area and the safety of society, it was decided to extend the closure of that area while ensuring the continued flow of food and medical supplies. There are three mobile medical units for examination, 6 ambulances and three clinics to deal with other cases in the Industrial Area.

Some other decisions mentioned were:

1. Companies can only use half of the capacity of buses while transporting workers within Qatar.
2. Excluding supermarkets, pharmacies and restaurants, working hours in selected 80% of private and government sectors can be no more than 8 hours, between 7 AM to 1 PM.
3. Home cleaning services, nanny services and hospitality services to be stopped effective immediately.
4. All important meetings at the workplace must be conducted online. No more than 5 people are allowed at one time during any physical meetings for the workplace.
5. Total number of employees at the workplace must be no more 20%, rest 80% to be working from home.
6. These decisions exclude those from the following sectors:
   1- Military and security sector
   2- Ministry of Foreign Affairs and diplomatic missions
   3- Health sector
   4- Oil and gas sector
   5 – Employees of government agencies whose nature of their work requires their presence, according to what is decided by the head of the competent authority
   6 – Workers in major state projects.
7. All these decisions are effective from 2nd April 2020.

For more information, please visit: Government Communications Office