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2.3 Georgia experiences its first wave of COVID-19
Until recently, the spread of the novel coronavirus in Georgia had formed a largely flat curve, with only a few bumps to reflect small outbreaks that were swiftly contained. The steep rise began in late August, as the count of new cases began increasing exponentially, jumping from low double-digits to about 150 cases a day by mid-September.
“After the regulations got relaxed internally and on the border, the transmission predictably began to pick up speed,” said Maia Butsashvili, an infectious disease doctor at the Tbilisi-based Neolab clinic and a frequent commentator on COVID-19. “Understandably, no country, except maybe a dictatorship like North Korea, could afford staying in lockdown indefinitely, and definitely not a small economy like Georgia.”
Starting in July, Georgia opened its borders a crack, allowing in tourists from Germany, France, and the three Baltic states without quarantining or testing them. But the post-Soviet countries that typically make up the bulk of Georgia’s tourists remained shut out.
With foreign tourist numbers only at a fraction of their usual level and the country’s hospitality industry struggling, the government encouraged Georgians to travel internally.
After the suffocating lockdowns in spring, Georgians did not need much persuading. Thousands hit the country’s new trendy travel spot, the cloud-shrouded mountaintop of Gomi, while others went up to Svaneti, Georgia’s trademark mountain region with its snowy peaks and medieval hamlets. The majority, though, hit the beach..
Svaneti saw an outbreak in early August and then Batumi erupted by the end of the month. By September 16, the pace of transmission in Georgia (196 new cases) had overtaken the daily tally in neighboring Azerbaijan (141 new cases) and was approaching the numbers in its other, comparably sized neighbour, Armenia (257 new cases).
“The initial containment postponed the inevitable: now Georgia is joining the rest of the world in terms of the COVID-19 situation,” Butsashvili said.
The majority of Georgia’s new infections were from Batumi and elsewhere in Adjara, while Tbilisi and other areas remained relatively unaffected. Georgia’s total number of confirmed cases stood at 2,758, and total deaths at 19. On both counts, Georgia remains far behind most European nations and all of its neighbours, where there are tens of thousands of total infections and hundreds dead.
After the new outbreak, the authorities said they did not intend to return to the broad lockdowns of the spring but would rely instead on more targeted measures. They have already postponed the start of in-person schooling, restricted the size of public gatherings and made testing mandatory for all foreign arrivals.
The shift in counter-pandemic strategy has been met with a good deal of confusion among Georgians, with many wondering why they had to go through the strict lockdowns in the spring only for the government to decide they were
8 GEORGIA Country Report October 2020 www.intellinews.com
