Coronavirus in Hungary: Non-essential shops open and risk being fined

Several business owners are reported to have run out of their savings over the last couple of weeks and decided to open up again, going against the current restrictions. Non-essential shopping will be monitored by the police, and violators will be fined.

Magyar Nemzet reports that several shop owners decided after a few weeks of shutting down to open again, going against current government restrictions. Right before Easter, the government extended restrictions on movement indefinitely to combat the novel coronavirus epidemic. According to these restrictions, people are only allowed to leave their homes to go to work or to run essential errands. Essential errands include grocery shopping, visiting the pharmacy or drugstore, and getting certain appliances one needs for their daily work. However, shopping for shoes, clothes, furniture, toys, books, or jewellery does not count as an essential errand.

According to statistics, there are at least 50,000 shops in the Hungarian market that cannot take customers until the restrictions are loosened or revoked. Nevertheless, several shops decided not to wait any longer and opened anyway. They argue that the economy did not stop, they are running out of savings, and they need profit to survive.