Athens deserted as three-week lockdown begins

Greece's capital city Athens was deserted on Saturday, on the first day of a national lockdown brought in to curb the spread of coronavirus.

All retail stores except those selling essential items such as food, medication and fuel will be shut.

Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis announced the lockdown to curb a rise in cases.

The city of Thessaloniki went into lockdown earlier in the week.

On Friday Greece announced a 14 new deaths and new 2,448 new cases, bringing the total number of confirmed cases to 52,254 with 715 fatalities.

A text messaging system is also being put back in place to grant people permission to leave their homes, allowed only for work, exercise, shopping for essentials or visiting a doctor.

Greece imposed an early lockdown in the spring, when it still had just a handful of cases.

The move was credited with keeping the number of cases, deaths and seriously ill people with COVID-19 low.

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