Norway says no more

The Herald reports:

Norway has ditched all its Covid-19 measures, even social distancing, in a radical move that as yet has unclear consequences.

On Friday, the Nordic nation’s government announced that it was time to “live as normal” with Covid-19 after 561 days of enduring some kind of restriction, whether that be venue capacity limits or stay-at-home orders.

Now, Norwegians can attend restaurants, night clubs, sporting events and anything else at full capacity, with social distancing thrown out the window.

They’ve even started encouraging travel outside of Europe, removing travel warnings.

The new rules come into effect on Saturday, 4pm local time (Sunday, 4am NZT).

“It is 561 days since we introduced the toughest measures in Norway in peacetime … Now the time has come to return to a normal daily life,” Prime Minister Erna Solberg told reporters.

More and more countries are doing this. The restrictions were the right thing to do, but they must be temporary not permament.