National Emergency Operations Centre (NEOC), on Sunday, revealed that 9,660 individuals were given clearance to leave resorts and safaris placed under lockdown as a protective measure amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
The government banned all travel between resorts and inhabited islands on March 14. The measure, intended to prevent local transmissions of the virus, was extended to liveaboards on March 21.
The travel ban left resort workers across the archipelago in de facto quarantine for nearly a month and placed them at high risk of contracting the virus from incoming tourists.
Following the government's decision to halt issuing on-arrival visas from March 27 onward, workers were permitted to leave their place of employment 14 days following the departure of the last tourist at their respective establishments.
Communications Undersecretary at the President's Office Mabrouq Abdul Azeez also revealed that the government released more than 800 people from quarantine facilities across the country after the mandatory 14-day period.
Mabrouq strongly urged the public to avoid discriminative behaviour against people released from quarantine.
Maldives now has 20 confirmed and six active cases of COVID-19, with a total of 14 recoveries.
The World Health Organization has classified the spread of COVID-19 as a global pandemic. The novel coronavirus has infected over 1.85 million people and claimed over 114,200 lives around the world. However, out of those infected, more than 427,800 people have recovered.
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