Police carried out 20 spot-checks on people who are supposed to be in mandatory quarantine yesterday and no one was found in breach of the rules, Prime Minister Robert Abela confirmed.

The spot-checks, which are being carried out by the police’s Administrative Law Enforcement section, commenced yesterday following a government directive to prevent the spread of the COVID-19 coronavirus. Anyone who is caught breaching quarantine will be subjected to a €1,000 fine.

Abela urged the public to cooperate and not let the situation escalate to a point where the government will have to impose a national lockdown, which he warned will cause “great suffering and inconvenience”.

“We have a good number of police officers but the reality is that it’s not possible for them to carry out spot checks on every single household which is supposed to be in quarantine,” he said. “They are doing the best they can, but this is less an issue of surveillance more an issue of public cooperation.”

“We’ve found a lot of cooperation so far; now is not the time to take things lightly and everyone who should be in mandatory quarantine should obey the rules.”

“Even those who went abroad in the past two weeks and aren’t legally obliged to be in quarantine should quarantine themselves anyway.”

He urged people to think about the more vulnerable people in society, noting that while around 80% of people impacted by the coronavirus won’t even need to go to hospital, they can still pass it on to a weaker member of society. 

“We shouldn’t be selfish but think of everyone around us,” he said. “This isn’t the moment for egoism and we should think of other people too.”