Malta has lifted its public health emergency warning, as the authorities repeal a raft of legal notices which introduced restrictions to contain the spread of coronavirus. 

The lifting comes into force on June 30.

Legal notices introduced late on Monday mean controls on social gatherings, the opening of schools or the law courts and suspensions of legal times will be no longer in force as of June 30.

This means schools will also be permitted to reopen in September.

The government also published a separate legal notice enabling travel to and from 22 countries from July 1. 

The countries are Austria, Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Norway, Italy (except Emilia Romagna, Lombardy and Piemonte), France, (except Ile-de-France), Slovakia, Switzerland, Greece, Croatia, Spain, (except Madrid, Catalonia, Castilla-La Mancha, Castile and Leon) and Poland.

Israel, one of the countries listed in an initial list of destinations people from Malta can fly to from July 1, is not included in the legal notice.

A significant number of EU countries have already lifted their travel restrictions.

Malta International Airport is putting in place a set of measures to safeguard the wellbeing of travellers and airport employees ahead of the partial lifting of the travel ban on July 1. Prime Minister Robert Abela said restrictions to all other destinations will be lifted by July 15.

The legal notices also provide for the reopening of schools, closed earlier this year with the rise of the COVID-19 threat. Their closure was later extended to the end of the scholastic year.

They will reopen in September with a legal notice repealing the order of their closure coming into force on June 30, by when the 2019/2020 scholastic year will be over.

The notice also repeals a number of other orders, including that suspending legal times relating to promise of sale agreements, notarial and related matters, that on the suspension of legal and judicial times, as well as those on the suspension of organised events and on the number of people in public spaces.

Abela said last weekend that that the pandemic was effectively over but Health Minister Chris Fearne said on Monday that mass events such as village feasts and large wedding receptions were still not recommended, despite the restrictions being lifted.

Malta has had 650 confirmed COVID-19 cases, although just 38 of those are active, current cases.

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