Anyone found bypassing the technical details of public health measures will face legal liability, says Ministry of Health and Medical Services Permanent Secretary Dr James Fong.

He made the clarification after some people in Vanua Levu were creating confusion about the social gathering details announced by Prime Minister Voreqe Bainimarama last Thursday.

Mr Bainimarama clearly stated that everywhere in Fiji, social gatherings of up to 20 people will be permitted indoors in people’s homes. For outdoor venues, they allow gatherings of up to 30 people.

Some people who plan to get married said that at one venue 50 people can gather: 20 inside the house and 30 outside the house.

“This is to me an unfortunate interpretation where people try to bypass the technical details of public health measures and ignore the spirit of the public health measures,” Dr Fong said.

“It is even more unfortunate given that the measures are to protect the public and not those who make the rules.”

He said technically this proposed idea meant the group indoors were not allowed to step out and vice versa, and if they do and it was observed, then there was legal liability.

The wearing of masks, maintaining a physical distance of two metres and careFIJI installed on everyone’s phones, with Bluetooth switched on applies in any form of social gathering.

Meanwhile, he confirmed there is zero active COVID-19 case in the Northern Division.

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