A member of the scientific committee advising the Turkish government on tackling the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic has reportedly cautioned that the time is not yet right to loosen restrictions.

The April 28 report from the Diken news website on Dr Tevfik Ozlu’s standpoint comes with Erdogan administration officials increasingly informing media that Turkey is looking to kickstart its economy, saying new COVID-19 cases and deaths have started to decline. That’s despite various medical experts and opposition party voices warning warning that the virus outbreak in Turkey—the worst outside Europe and the US by the number of infections—was not yet under control and that big moves to reopen the economy could trigger a new wave of infections. Turkey is widely thought to have not portrayed the true scale of its COVID-19 difficulties via its chosen testing and reporting mechanisms, with The New York Times suggesting on April 20 that data on the Istanbul toll of deaths from all causes “hints Turkey is hiding a wider coronavirus calamity”. At the same time, some analysts are predicting that because Turkey did not bring in a generalised lockdown in response to the pandemic—but instead chose to introduce selective curfews and leave, for instance, many factories and construction sites operational—the country may do better than the 5% GDP contraction for 2020 lately predicted by the IMF. BNP Paribas has said the drop may be limited to 2%.

The government may resume flights around a three-day religious holiday beginning on May 24, an official was cited by Bloomberg as saying on April 27. The cabinet was also reportedly due to discuss on that day the re-opening schools for about a month before the summer vacation in June.

Huseyin Altas, chairman of the Shopping Centres and Investors Association (AYD), told Daily Sabah on April 27 that malls may be gradually re-opened from May 11, saying shoppers could be checked for fevers and masks supplied at entrances.

Critics have complained that there has been a reduction in the government’s centralised system of testing for coronavirus and that this could have caused a fall in the number of new infections registered per day. Deaths are also not confirmed in Turkey as caused by COVID-19 if the deceased have not been tested before they die.

Turkey will impose its third-straight weekend lockdown on its most populous cities and provinces this weekend. Friday May 1 is the Labour Day public holiday.