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| - Norway will again allow restaurants and bars to serve alcohol as part of a gradual easing of coronavirus restrictions, the government said Tuesday. The Nordic country tightened restrictions in late March, including banning the sale of alcohol for restaurants and bars, in response to a surge in cases driven by more contagious Covid-19 variants. Since the Easter holiday, during which many travel to visit family, had not seemed to worsen the situation, the government said it would start reversing the measures. "We are launching the reopening of large parts of Norway this week," Prime Minister Erna Solberg, who herself was recently fined 2,000 euros ($2,400) for violating health guidelines, told a news conference Tuesday. This represents the first of four steps in a reopening plan presented last week. From Friday onwards, bars and restaurants will be allowed to serve alcohol until 10 pm, as long as they serve food. It will also be possible to have up to five guests at home -- compared to only two currently -- and stadiums will be able to accommodate up to 600 people divided into three groups. The rules and recommendations will apply nationwide, but areas with high levels of infection, such as Oslo and the surrounding area, will be able to maintain tighter local restrictions if necessary. Residents of the capital will therefore likely have to wait a while longer before they can order a drink in public. On April 7, Solberg unveiled a plan for reopening in four stages, but remained elusive on exact dates for when life could return to a more normal situation, only hinting that the end of June seemed likely. However, this is largely dependent on the rollout of vaccines. After some rare but serious cases of blood clots, the Norwegian health authorities suspended the use of AstraZeneca's Covid-19 vaccine on March 11. But unlike most of Europe, Norway never resumed administering the vaccine and said it will make a decision on its future use on Thursday. US drugmaker Johnson & Johnson announced on Tuesday that it had decided to delay the roll-out of its own vaccine in Europe for similar reasons. According to Line Vold, head of the Norwegian Institute of Public Health, managing without the two jabs could delay the country's vaccination campaign "by eight to 12 weeks", or until early October for all adults. Norway still has one of the lowest incidence rates of the virus in Europe with 218.7 new cases per 100,000 inhabitants, according to the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control. Iceland, which tightened its own restrictions at the end of March, also announced on Tuesday that it was easing some of its measures. From Thursday, the limit on public gatherings will be raised from 10 to 20 people, while bars -- closed since the end of March -- will be allowed to stay open until 9pm. Swimming pools and gyms will reopen at 50 percent of their normal capacity. phy/hdy/jll
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