Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan has issued a statement saying:

“Unfortunately, we have three new cases of coronavirus today.

Two people are citizens of the Republic of Armenia (45 and 27 years old) and one Italian (51 years old) works in Armenia. All three have arrived from Italy.

To isolate them now, the scope of their contact is clarified, which, according to preliminary data, is not large.

The Italian citizen and one of the RA citizens do not have any complaints. One of the RA citizens is suffering from pneumonia.

Patients were recorded upon arrival.

Predicting the criticism of why we did not make the decision to stop flights from Italy, I would say that we had discussed this possibility several times and have come to the obvious conclusion that potential carriers can come to Armenia from neighboring Italy: France, Austria, as there are no restrictions within the EU.

That is to say, we would have to terminate other European destinations by the same logic, especially since coronavirus is spread to other European countries as well.

Now the airlines have decided to stop flights from Italy.

The people in Golden Palace and the first diagnosed patient are fine and have no complaints.

Dear compatriots, please keep calm and follow the advice of the Ministry of Health on the measures to prevent coronavirus.”