Moscow is lifting its partial lockdown after one and a half weeks, the mayor announced on Wednesday, despite consistently high Covid-19 figures.
The situation in hospitals and elsewhere has eased, Sergey Sobyanin was quoted by the Interfax news agency as saying. As a result, a week-long break for workers, decreed by Russian President Vladimir Putin for the entire country, will not be extended beyond Monday in the capital.
Moscow and other hard-hit regions introduced additional restrictions in conjunction with the work stoppage. In the capital, a city of over 12 million, only supermarkets and pharmacies have been allowed to open since Thursday last week, with a few exceptions.
Sobyanin explained that rules from before the partial lockdown will continue to apply, meaning that residents must show proof of vaccination or Covid-19 recovery, or a negative test, if they want to go to places like theatres and museums.
Moscow authorities counted over 6,800 new cases of infection on Wednesday and 95 deaths. Experts believe that the actual numbers are much higher.
Over the same one-day period, over 40,400 infections were registered across Russia and 1,189 people died with the virus - the highest toll since the pandemic began.
Other regions, including Chelyabinsk in the Urals, extended the work-free period by a further week.
Many business representatives have complained about the measures, arguing that they place too high a burden on industry - and particularly small businesses, since employers had been ordered to pay their staff during the pause.
