Cafes and restaurants will open at the beginning of next week, said Health Minister Venko Filipce on Wednesday.

Minister Filipce said cafes and restaurants would open next Tuesday if the Commission for Infectious Diseases made the decision this Friday.

He disagrees that Macedonia has most deaths in the region.

Mortality is not highest in the region. It is not calculated per capita but by the number of infections. We need to consider that 22 out of the 110 deaths in the country were diagnosed post-mortem, which is not done by other countries. We are doing this in order to have a broader picture of the outbreak. If these 22 cases are taken out, then the mortality rate is even lower, said Filipce.

He added that post-mortem diagnostics enables analysis of the contacts of the person, in order to assess if the deceased infected others.