The Covid-19 Crisis Management Coordination Centre has decided to recommend a slew of measures to curb the spread of the virus as cases have started surging over the past few days, with Omicron, the highly contagious variant, confirmed in as many as 24 samples on Friday.

The Covid-19 Crisis Management Coordination Centre (CCMCC), the government body to respond to Covid-19, on Sunday decided to recommend restrictions on gatherings of more than 25 people.

It also decided to recommend that the Ministry of Home Affairs issue circulars to local authorities to implement its recommendation. Its recommendation will come into effect once the concerned ministries take decisions.

The CCMCC has also recommended that the government close schools until January 29.

“All the basic and secondary schools would issue notice to the guardians not to send their wards until January 29,” reads one of 13 recommendations made by the committee. It has also recommended administering vaccines to the children between 12 and 17 year during the vacation.

The CCMCC has also decided to recommend that the Home Ministry make vaccination cards mandatory for people to receive public services from January 17.

According to its decisions, to enter public places like offices, hotels, restaurants, cinema halls, stadiums, airports and parks, among others, members of the public must present their vaccination cards or their photos on their mobile phones.

It has also recommended that the Ministry of Health and Population manage people testing positive from antigen tests at the respective border points from where they enter, in institutional isolation (holding centres, hotels) in coordination with the District Covid-19 Management Centre.

The CCMCC has recommended the Ministry of Tourism, Culture and Civil Aviation to arrange the flights so that there is no crowd in airports while also making it mandatory to produce the vaccination card for the boarding pass starting January 17.

On Sunday, according to the health ministry, 841 new cases were confirmed from 8,848 PCR tests while 326 positive cases were reported from 3,784 antigen tests in the last 24 hours.