Government renews state of calamity

The government decided to renew the state of calamity throughout the country until 11.59 pm on 15 November and to extend the special measures that had been established for the municipalities of Felgueiras, Lousada and Paços de Ferreira to 121 municipalities, with some additional changes.
 
Thus, for the municipalities covered by the new measures, the Council of Ministers established:

• the duty to stay at home, except for journeys authorised in advance, to which are added the journeys for activities carried out in day centres, as well as journeys to post offices, bank branches and insurance or insurance brokers' agencies and the journeys necessary to leave continental national territory;
• as a rule, all retail and service establishments, as well as those in commercial complexes, close until 10 pm;
• restaurants must close until 10.30 p.m;
• it is envisaged that the President of the municipality with territorial jurisdiction may set a closing time lower than the maximum limit, subject to the approval of the local health authority and the security forces;
• the prohibition of celebrations and other events with more than five persons, unless they belong to the same household; 
• a ban on fairs and markets;
• the possibility of holding religious ceremonies, in accordance with the rules of the General Directorate of Health;
• the obligation to implement the teleworking regime, regardless of employment relationship, whenever the functions in concern allow it, unless the worker is prevented from doing so;
• the exceptional and transitional regime of work reorganisation (contained in DL 79-A/2020) is applicable to companies with workplaces with 50 or more workers, in all the municipalities covered by the new measures (currently this regime was applicable to the metropolitan areas of Lisbon and Porto).

These exceptional measures enter into force on 4 November and will apply to a total of 121 municipalities. The decision on which municipalities would be covered by the new measures was based on three criteria: 

• 240 new cases per 100 000 inhabitants in the last 14 days
• proximity to another municipality that meets the first criteria
• and not consideration of outbreaks in low-density municipalities. 
• In addition to the exceptional measures described above, the number of people in each group in restaurants for the whole continental territory is limited to 6, unless they belong to the same household.

 
Find out in which municipalities the new measures to combat the pandemic will be applied.
 
Source: Portal do Governo