Nepal: Covid-19 lockdown extended in Kathmandu Valley till Aug 11

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The authorities in Nepal's Kathmandu Valley on Tuesday extended the ongoing lockdown till August 11 to contain the COVID-19 pandemic.

The current round of lockdown expires on Wednesday midnight local time and the three districts in the valley -- Kathmandu, Lalitpur and Bhaktapur -- decided to extend it by another seven days starting from Thursday.

As per the prohibitory orders, shops can remain open till 7 pm. People are allowed to go outside by maintaining social distancing and adopting standard health protocols like using hand sanitiser. However, public meetings, social events and demonstrations are not allowed.

Schools, cinema halls and theatres are not allowed to open.

In recent weeks, authorities in the Kathmandu Valley have been gradually easing the provisions of lockdown while extending it time and again from the starting date on April 29. On July 4, they lifted all the restrictive measures against public and private transportation services, and shops were allowed more operation hours.

Nepal has been gripped by a second wave of the coronavirus since early April.

Meanwhile, the health ministry on Tuesday confirmed 3,383 new coronavirus cases and 24 more fatalities due to the disease, taking the total nationwide COVID tally to 765,815 and the death toll to 9,922.