In an analysis by the non-profit organization Deep Knowledge Group made for the Forbes magazine on the response of selected 200 countries in the world to the Covid-19 pandemic, Macedonia is on the devastating 103rd place, in company with the Dominican Republic, Antigua and Barbuda, Grenada, Kyrgyzstan, Mauritius and St. Lucia.

This table shows the countries with the worst response to the virus.

Neighboring countries are not even close to where Macedonia ranks in terms of the coronavirus response. Greece, along with Slovenia and Croatia, is among the top 40 countries, with Albania, Serbia and Bulgaria at the top half of the list, and even Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Macedonia is experiencing a fiasco on several tables for dealing with the coronavirus, which is pushing the us into greater abyss and isolation. We remain the only country in the region that has not opened its borders, and a growing number of countries such as Bulgaria and Slovenia have introduced a mandatory 14-day quarantine for all arrivals from Macedonia. In Montenegro, though, we are not welcome at all.

According to the latest statistics on the number of new cases and deaths per million inhabitants, Macedonia is a leader in the region with a new cases rate of 50.5 percent at the beginning of this month, unlike the numbers in the region where the new cases rate for all countries is 3.6 percent.

In one week from 01.06.2020, Macedonia registered a total of 802 new cases and 20 deaths, which is not only a number making the country leader in the region, but also a devastating number for dealing with the coronavirus in the country.

What is worrying is also the total number of deaths since the onset of the pandemic, which is 153 deaths, as well as the huge number of active cases, which has reached 2,226.

Although Health Minister Venko Filipce said they were well-known clusters, that only fifteen families made up 90 percent of the new cases, the number is expected to rise in the coming period as over 80,000 citizens left Skopje this weekend, which might contribute to the spread the virus in other parts of the country.