The bill on quarantine and isolation, adopted
The Senates plenary sitting has passed the controversial bill on quarantine and isolation.
Roxana Vasile, 17.07.2020, 14:00
The Romanian Parliament has passed the bill on quarantine and isolation. The Senate, as the decision-making body in this case, gave it a green light on Thursday evening. Let’s remember that on June 25, Constitutional Court judges ruled that isolation at home, quarantine and hospitalisation cannot be imposed based on ministerial order, even if the persons in question are infected with the novel coronavirus. They said that imposing restrictive measures could only be established by a law that clearly regulated them.
The ruling of the Constitutional Court came after a complaint by the Ombudsman referring to some provisions of a law on healthcare reform from 2006 and the government emergency order on measures to prevent and combat the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic. On July 6, the Government approved a new bill regarding the initiation of hygienic-sanitary measures to be taken in special situations of high epidemiological or biological risk. The bill mainly regulated the conditions for quarantine and isolation. The document was submitted to Parliament for approval and, following the request of president Klaus Iohannis, PM Ludovic Orban and State Secretary with the Interior Ministry, Raed Arafat, should have been passed at great speed, to avoid the risk of having people infected with coronavirus free to discharge themselves from hospitals.
Experts, the Social Democratic opposition and NGOs criticised the bill, saying it leaves room for abuse. On July 9th an amended version of the bill was passed by the Chamber of Deputies and was then submitted to the Senate, the decision-making body in this case. Adopted on July 16, almost a month after the Constitutional Court’s ruling, the law stipulates that asymptomatic people confirmed to carry the Covid-19 virus will be kept under medical supervision in hospital for 48 hours, followed by isolation at home or another residential address for a further 14 days. Minors are to be isolated at the home of their family or legal guardians or another address and its up to their families to check them into hospital. The bill also stipulates that the medical staff cannot be posted for more than 30 days. People coming from risk areas or who had contact with people who tested positive to the virus will be quarantined.
The bill passed on Thursday is very different from the version initially sent to Parliament. It is a compromise bill and is far from perfect but, according to the MPs, it provides the legal framework need by the medical system. There are Romanians, however, who fear they may be turned into ‘suspects’ whose faith depends on the decision of health authorities.
(Translated by Elena Enache)
