Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin announced the closure of the border with Belarus from March 16 to prevent nCoV from spreading.

"We will do everything we can to protect the country from new threats, proactively respond and take comprehensive measures to prevent the immediate spread of nCoV from the beginning," Prime Minister Mishustin said in a statement. press conference today in Moscow when it announced the order to close the border with Belarus, a close ally of Russia.

He said Russia would open a "green channel" for essential goods circulating with Belarus for a month, starting March 17, when the border gate between the two countries was closed.

The order to close the border with Georgia will also take effect today, only exemptions for Russian citizens returning home. Russia shares land borders with 14 countries, but so far only open borders with two countries, Finland and Azerbaijan.

It also stopped or significantly reduced trains to Ukraine, Latvia, China, Mongolia and many other countries. Russia first closed its border to prevent Covid-19 on January 30, applying a border of more than 4,100 km bordering China.

63 cases of nCoV were detected in Russia, all of them originating from abroad and there have been no cases of domestic transmission, of which 8 people have recovered and no deaths have been reported. Belarus, meanwhile, recorded 27 cases of nCoV, while Georgia detected 33.

Covid-19 originated in Wuhan, China in December 2019, has now appeared in 158 countries and territories, leaving more than 170,000 people infected, more than 6,500 dead. The World Health Organization (WHO) on 13 March declared Europe a global epidemic, of which Italy was the country most heavily affected by Covid-19 with more than 24,700 cases and more than 1,800 deaths.