Norway removed the remaining virus restrictions as it sees their effects as more damaging than higher infection, downgrading the outbreak from severe.
"We are well protected, and aren’t served by pushing the pandemic out in time,” Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Store told reporters in Oslo on Saturday. Face masks are no longer needed, while maintaining a meter’s distance and isolating after infection are no longer mandated, he said.
Norway joins neighboring Denmark and Sweden in removing restrictions, expecting the coronavirus to turn endemic. The omicron variant has pushed infection rates to records, but the number of people in intensive care units has dropped, indicating that the milder variant and booster shots will enable the country to return to an everyday without controls.
As many as 4 million of the country’s 5.4 million inhabitants may be infected by summer, the government said. Recommendations are still in place and municipalities can implement local measures as needed.
While Covid-19 is still considered a dangerous infectious disease, the current situation is no longer a serious outbreak, it said.
