As the COVID-19 coronavirus spreads around the world, both doctors and policy makers increasingly recommend that people distance themselves from others to slow the virus.
Like many countries, Ukraine has imposed restrictions on public gatherings and travel — effectively, social distancing as policy.
But in an appearance on the ICTV channel’s Freedom of Speech program late on March 16, Zelensky set out two different tasks for two different groups of Ukrainians as the country attempts to counteract the novel coronavirus.
Ordinary Ukrainians should use this time at home, which is important for public health but essentially boring, to connect with the family members — and make new ones.
Meanwhile, oligarchs should take the opportunity to pay the country back for all it has given them.
Home quarantine
On March 12, Ukraine launched a three-week nationwide quarantine, closing schools and banning mass events.
The country has closed its borders to foreigners and will also halt international and domestic flights on March 17 and 18, respectively. Additionally, it plans to close virtually all stores except supermarkets, pharmacies, banks and gas stations.
Speaking on ICTV, Zelensky advised Ukrainians to stay at home as much as possible as the country prepares to limit public transportation.
“Read books, watch movies,” he said. “Sometimes, because of work, we don’t have time for a conversation with our children.”
As for the young people, the president continued, it is time for them to fight a different kind of crisis: a demographic one.
Ukraine’s population has been shrinking due to migration and low birth rates. According to the December 2019 electronic census, Ukraine’s present population is 37.3 million, excluding those citizens living abroad and on the Russian-occupied territories.
After independence in 1991, the population was 52 million people and dropped over the three decades.
Helping to fight coronavirus with money
Ukraine has only seven confirmed cases of COVID-19, among the lowest numbers in Europe. One patient, an elderly woman, died from the disease on March 13.
Still, the government is attempting to prepare for more cases and a broader outbreak.
On ICTV, Zelensky spoke about his March 16 meeting with owners of the biggest businesses in Ukraine, which included several prominent oligarchs: namely, Rinat Akhmetov and Ihor Kolomoisky. At the meeting, he told them to step up and help the government to deal with the pandemic, Zelensky said.
“I told them frankly: ‘This country has fed you for many years, now it’s time for you to help it,” Zelensky told ICTV. “We need money for medications. We need Hr 12-13 billion ($450 million.) We need 500 ambulances for hospitals.”
He added that an additional Hr 10 billion ($375 million) is needed for one-time payments to people receiving pensions under Hr 5,000 ($187). They were promised extra Hr 1,000 ($37)
Moreover, the presidential office is in talks with major retailers and postal service providers to arrange the delivery of food and medications to those who can’t leave their homes, in particular, the elderly or mothers with small children.
One million rapid coronavirus testing kits will be delivered to Ukraine from China, Zelensky said, thanks to Jack Ma, founder of the Alibaba Group, who gave $80 million for the tests, and Ukrainian businessman Oleksandr Yaroslavsky.
Chinese billionaire Ma first visited Ukraine last November and spoke at the Kyiv International Economic Forum alongside Zelensky.
CORONAVIRUS IN UKRAINE: WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW
- Kyiv intensifies quarantine, shutting down everything by supermarkets, pharmacies, banks, gas stations.
- Zelensky urged the government to shut down public transport.
- There have been seven confirmed cases of COVID-19 in Ukraine. The first case was identified in Ukraine on March 3.
- One person died from the COVID-19 in Ukraine.
- Ukraine shut schools and canceled mass events starting March 12 to prevent the disease’s spread. Some schools resisted.
- Here’s how Kyiv is affected.
- Why the Kyiv Post isn’t making its coverage free in the times of COVID-19.
- Doctor’s advice: How to stay safe.
- Ukrainians evacuated from the disease’s epicenter in Wuhan, China spent two weeks in quarantine in a sanatorium in Poltava Oblast and were released on March 5. Their arrival in Ukraine caused unrest.
Effects on economy:
- Here’s what the virus is doing to Ukraine’s economy.
- Ukrainian businesses respond to the crisis.
- The virus disrupts the transport sector. Ukrainian airlines canceled some flights to 16 countries due to the novel coronavirus.
- The National Bank of Ukraine continued to cut the policy rate while trying to buffer the hryvnia from coronavirus panic.
