Ireland is in the top 30 of least restricted nations despite the bombshell decision to postpone re-opening of pubs.
After one of the strictest Covid-19 regimes in the world we now enjoy one of the more relaxed according to a respected lockdown tracker.
The Oxford University “stringency index” scores us at 39 out of a possible 100 for severity of restrictions.
That has fallen from a high of 91 at the peak of the pandemic here.
It means lockdown measures here are among the most relaxed of 178 countries tracked.
Britain still ranks at 70 on the scale, Denmark at 60 and Australia at 73.
The index for Italy is 44, Spain, 50, Sweden 41 while the U.S is 69.
New Zealand now has one of the most relaxed regimes with a score of just 19 according to the table from the respected Blavatnik School of Government’s tracker.
A spokeswoman said: “There are about 30-40 countries with a stringency index of less than 40.
“Ireland has lower stringency than Australia, UK, and the US although we weight towards the state with the strictest policy, so our index hides a lot of variation among US states.”
Nicaragua remains one of the least restricted nations with a ranking of just 11 while Azerbajan’s lockdown is still at a level of 96 as the virus rages around the world.
Ireland had been one of the slowest European nations out of lockdown but the pace of easing has accelerated up to this week.
The controversial decision to allow tourists to keep flying here helps put Ireland among the more relaxed Covid-19 regimes.
In May researcher Toby Phillips told the Irish Mirror: “Ireland did have a pretty strict lockdown, most European countries had a lower response level.
“Ireland’s maximum stringency in our index was around 91, and most countries in Europe had a maximum stringency within 10 points of this.
“We certainly wouldn’t characterise it as an outlier I would be wary of reading much into a difference of less 10 points – that could be something like whether some trains kept running, or whether pre-school was left open. A difference of less than 10 points could even be a quirk in the data.”
