TIRANA, March 13 (Xinhua) -- A total of 509 drivers in Albania have been penalized for violating a traffic ban to contain the spread of coronavirus, the state police said in a press release on Friday.
According to the release, the Albanian government has banned the circulation of all public and private vehicles for three days between 6:00 am local time on Friday and 12:00 midnight on Sunday in eight Albanian cities, including the capital Tirana.
"Seventy-six of the penalized drivers were escorted to police stations for opposing the police officers on the administrative measure imposed in these cases for breaking the law and their cars were blocked," the police said.
The ban was announced on Thursday in an effort to fight the spread of COVID-19 in the country.
At a press conference on Friday, Deputy Minister of Health and Social Protection Mira Rakacolli said that over the past 24 hours the Institute of Public Health had carried out a total of 159 coronavirus tests, bringing the total number of such tests to 457.
"So far in Albania we have 33 positive COVID-19 cases. Eight of them are hospitalized in Tirana in the Infectious Disease Hospital, while 25 cases are self-isolated at home in good health," Rakacolli said.
Rakacolli said that one of the confirmed cases is a doctor, who was infected in Durres while treating the first coronavirus patient in Albania.
"The infected doctor has no symptoms and is currently self-isolated in Durres," Rakacolli added.
Albania reported its first coronavirus case on Monday.
