COVID-19 pandemic in Poland

In February and March 2020, health authorities in Poland carried out laboratory testing of suspected cases of infection by SARS-CoV-2, as well as home quarantining and monitoring.

Polish authorities opted into the European Union's tender procedure for purchasing COVID-19 pandemic-related medical equipment on March 17, 2020.

On 20 March 2020, the Ministry of Health officially declared an epidemic and on the same day tried to prevent medical personnel from commenting on the pandemic.

Lockdown restrictions were tightened on 31 March 2020 by a government regulation, requiring individuals walking in streets to be separated by two metres, closing parks, boulevards, beaches, hairdressers and beauty salons, and forbidding unaccompanied minors from exiting their homes.

During January 2020, Warsaw Chopin Airport carried out special screening measures for passengers arriving from China.

[7] In February and March 2020, health authorities in Poland carried out laboratory testing of suspected cases of infection by SARS-CoV-2, as well as home quarantining and monitoring.

[10] On 19 February 2020, twelve people remained hospitalised "in connection with the coronavirus", 13 were under home quarantine and 1000 were being monitored by health services.

[11] On 27 February 47 people remained hospitalised with suspicions of SARS-CoV-2 infection, 55 were under home quarantine and 1570 were being monitored by health services.

[9] Polish Minister of Health Łukasz Szumowski stated on 27 February that he expected positive SARS-CoV-2 laboratory confirmed cases in the following days.

[27][28] and the same day, Armed Forces General Commander gen. Jarosław Mika was diagnosed [29] and the eighteenth confirmed SARS-CoV-2 infection was announced in the Masovian Voivodeship.

Lawyers contacted by OKO.press expected the restrictions to be issued as a regulation (secondary legislation) (Polish: rozporządzenie), which they considered would be an unconstitutional method of introducing the rules.

Hotels were allowed to operate only if they had residents in quarantine, in another form of isolation, on an obligatory work delegation for services such as building construction or medical purposes.

Former prime minister of Poland Leszek Miller described the gathering as showing contempt for ordinary people respecting the COVID-19 restrictions.

[69] In March 2020, the Minister of Health Łukasz Szumowski claimed that European solidarity in the provision of medical equipment to Poland had failed.

[62] OKO.press referred to the European Union tender process for masks and other protective equipment as a "success" that Poland applied for very late, and commented as context that the EU does not have the legal powers to impose health management policy, such as quarantine measures or closing schools, on member states.

[62] On 19 March 2020 the EU had announced the creation of the rescEU strategic stockpile of medical equipment, to be financed at the level of 90% by the commission, to deal with the COVID-19 pandemic.

[citation needed] In November 2021, officers from the Central Police Investigation Bureau detained 11 people who were supposed to help organise false certificates confirming vaccination against COVID-19.

In 2020, one third of Poles aged 18–65 had stated in a study that they would never want to be vaccinated against COVID-19, more so in rural areas with a high representation of the ruling PIS party.

[75][non-primary source needed][76][77] on 1 April 2020, the government launched a plan of public assistance to businesses, called the "Anti-crisis Shield" (Polish: Tarcza antykryzysowa).

[78] Business finance measures include:[80] Polish authorities and citizens took several solidarity actions to support people in other countries affected by the pandemic and to help in repatriations.

[93] The Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs allocated 1.2 million PLN to projects aimed at supporting emergency services in Georgia and Ukraine.

[94] A convoy of the Polish State Fire Service carrying humanitarian cargo for the National Medical Response Center arrived in Minsk in Belarus on 24 April, for medical institutions in Grodno Oblast, including 50,000 litres of disinfectant, 30,000 litres of antiseptic, 100,000 surgical masks and chloroquine.

[100] The Polish airline LOT used Twitter to organise a "#LOTdoDomu" ("#aFLIGHTHome") return program of 2,000 people to their countries of origin, including 18 other member states of the European Union (EU).

Polish authorities offered ferry and dedicated train services, and 18 convoys of 800 vehicles, escorted by police, to help Estonians, Latvians and Lithuanians to return to their countries.

[103] On 20 March, the secretary of state of the Ministry of Health, Józefa Szczurek-Żelazko, sent a written statement ordering voivodeship medical consultants to not make statements about SARS-CoV-2, the epidemiological situation, the risks for medical staff or methods of protection from infection, unless they had first consulted with the Ministry of Health or Główny Inspektorat Sanitarny [pl].

Szczurek-Żelazko motivated the order by the need to provide correct, unified information and to avoid unjustified unrest in the medical community.

[119] Stefan Karczmarewicz, writing in Polityka, interpreted this as an attempt by authorities to lower the official COVID-19 death toll in Poland.

He argued that there was a policy of limiting the number of SARS-CoV-2 tests, which together with the exclusion of the ICD-10 category U07.2 implied an underestimate of the true COVID-19 death toll.

On 6 April 2020 Bartosz Fiałek, a Polish rheumatologist, claimed that the NIPH–NIH instructions were unclear, and that it appeared that U07.2 was not being used for COVID-19 deaths in hospital in which SARS-CoV-2 tests had not been carried out, nor for people dying of COVID-19 in quarantine.

[125] Gazeta Pomorska [pl] stated that the head of the voivodeship only accepted including the 64-year-old's death in official reports after the newspaper "intervened".