Woman wears a mask amid coronavirus disease (COVID-19) restrictions in Rzeszow, Poland, October 16, 2020. Sign reads "Keep distance". (REUTERS File Photo)
WARSAW, November 4 (Reuters): Poland announced further restrictions on Wednesday to halt the spread of the coronavirus and said it would impose a full national lockdown if COVID-19 cases continue to surge.
As daily infections and deaths hit new records, Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said most shops in shopping malls, theatres, museums, galleries and cinemas would close.
All school pupils who are not already working remotely will start to do so, while hotels will remain open only for business guests.
"If this plan fails, then in a week or 10 days we will have a national quarantine, which will be very severe," Morawiecki told a news conference.
Earlier, Poland reported 24,692 new COVID-19 cases and 373 deaths, rattling investors fretting about the economic fallout from the pandemic and sending Warsaw's main stock index, the WIG20, sharply lower. It was down 1.3% at 1317 GMT.
"These records (in infections) are scary, the question is what's next. Yesterday we received information that a full lockdown cannot be excluded," a broker based in Warsaw said.
Polish media have reported that the country is running out of hospital beds, ventilators, oxygen and medics.
Poland has already shut bars and restaurants, limited the operations of swimming pools, and asked the elderly to stay at home.
The country of 38 million has so far reported a total of 439,536 COVID-19 infections, including 6,475 deaths, with the fastest growth seen in recent weeks.
The ruling Law and Justice party (PiS) has said recent huge protests against a near total abortion ban in Poland will result in more COVID-19 infections.
Some immunologists, however, said the protesters wore face masks, stayed apart and marched in the open air, which reduces the risk of infection. Protest organisers said the government was wrongly trying to shift blame for its own failure to contain the pandemic onto them.
