A staff member of a pharmacy delivers goods for customers in Buenos Aires, Argentina, March 20, 2020. (Xinhua/Martin Zabala)
Banks and financial institutions will be allowed to resume operating next week, but with protocols in place similar to those being used at supermarkets.
BUENOS AIRES, April 8 (Xinhua) -- Argentina's President Alberto Fernandez on Wednesday announced he was stepping up COVID-19 containment measures in major cities, including extending a shelter-in-place order due to end on April 12.
"There will be no lifting or relaxing" of the lockdown, but "more restrictions than there are today," Fernandez said in an interview on TV Channel 13, declining to provide an end date for the measure.
"The quarantine must continue because … we have only succeeded in flattening the curve (of the infection rate) and made it slower," he said.
However, officials are looking at relaxing social distancing in "some activities that appear to be less risky," though not in large urban centers, said Fernandez.
Banks and financial institutions will be allowed to resume operating next week, but with protocols in place similar to those being used at supermarkets.
"They will attend to a small number of people inside the branch and with extreme care," said the president.
People should stay at home and not let down their guard, he warned.
Argentina has reported 1,715 confirmed cases of COVID-19 and 60 deaths until noon on Wednesday. ■