Countries and territories around the world enforced lockdowns of varying stringency in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
This included total movement control while others enforced restrictions based on time. In many cases, only essential businesses were allowed to remain open. Schools, universities and colleges closed either on a nationwide or local basis in countries, affecting approximately percent of the world's student population.
Beginning with the first lockdown in China's Hubei province and nationwide in Italy in March 2020, lockdowns continued to be implemented in many countries throughout 2020 and 2021. On 24 March 2020, the entire 1.3 billion population of India was ordered to stay at home during its lockdown, making it the largest of the pandemic. The world's longest continuous lockdown lasting 234 days took place in Buenos Aires, Argentina, in 2020. As of October 2021, the city of Melbourne, Australia, and certain cities in Peru and Chile spent the most cumulative days in lockdown over separate periods, although measures varied between these countries.
A few countries and territories did not use the strategy, including Japan, Belarus, Nicaragua, Sweden, South Korea, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Tanzania, Uruguay, two states in Brazil (Roraima and Rondônia) and certain United States states.
Countries and territories with lockdowns
Argentina
ASPO and DISPO in Argentina: A successful example of a combination of non-pharmacological and pharmacological measures for the care of the pandemic population:
Mandatory Preventive Social Isolation (ASPO) decreed by the national executive branch:
On March 12, 2020, one day after the WHO declared the outbreak of the new coronavirus as a pandemic, the national State issued the Decree of Necessity and Urgency (DNU) No. 260/2020 by which the public health emergency established by Law No. 27,541 on December 21, 2019, was extended for a period of one year. The recitals of this decree express: “That in the last few days, the spread of cases of the new coronavirus Covid-19 has been noted in numerous countries of different continents, reaching our region and our country. That, in the current situation, it is necessary to adopt new timely, transparent, consensual and evidence-based measures, in addition to those already adopted since the beginning of this epidemiological situation, in order to mitigate its spread and its health impact”.
On March 19, 2020, the National Executive Power issued DNU No. 297/2020, which provided for the mandatory preventive social isolation (ASPO) for all persons living in the country or temporarily in the country at the time of its issuance, in order to protect public health, an inalienable obligation of the national State. This provision provided that while the ASPO was in force, people should remain in their usual residences, refrain from going to their workplaces and could not travel on roads, highways and public spaces, in order to prevent the circulation and spread of the COVID-19 virus and the consequent impact on public health and other derived subjective rights, such as the life and physical integrity of people. Permanent controls were also established on routes, roads and public spaces, accesses and other strategic places, in order to guarantee compliance with the regulations established within the framework of the sanitary emergency. On the other hand, as the mandatory isolation was extended, it was assumed that the epidemiological situation was not homogeneous within the national territory and different quarantine modalities began to be adopted according to the reality of the different jurisdictions of the country, in accordance with a joint work between national and local authorities. Therefore, DNU No. 355/2020, dated April 11, already established that the Governors or the Head of the City Government could submit to the national Government, for its authorization, proposals to free some activities with the due adoption of operating protocols for each case. Exceptions to the ASPO and to the prohibition to circulate were also progressively incorporated, in order not to interrupt the supply of essential products and services and, also, to incorporate the performance of different economic activities in those places where the evolution of the epidemiological situation would allow it. On the other hand, DNU No. 459/2020, dated May 11, specified a geographical segmentation to provide for exceptions to the ASPO, distinguishing three segments: departments or districts with up to 500,000 inhabitants, departments or districts with more than 500,000 inhabitants, and the Metropolitan Area of Buenos Aires (AMBA). This Decree defined exceptions for the first two segments and made a difference with the AMBA, as the most complicated area of contagion5 . DNU No. 520/20, at the end of June, established as a parameter to differentiate the geographical realities the doubling time of cases confirmed by COVID-19: restrictions could be released if this period was not less than 15 days and if the health system had sufficient capacity to respond to the health demand. For urban agglomerates, departments or districts that did not meet these requirements, the ASPO was extended. These differentiated modalities of quarantine according to the epidemiological realities of the country showed interesting results. Thus, in the recitals of DNU N° 520/2020 of June 7, the recovery of the economic activity in most of the country was highlighted: “According to data provided by the Ministry of Productive Development of the Nation, more than SIXTY-FIVE PERCENT (65%) of the registered workers of the whole country are already part of activities authorized to produce; in some provinces, this number climbs up to EIGHTY PERCENT (80%)”. It is important to add that on May 13, 2020, the Senate of the Nation approved a set of Decrees of Necessity and Urgency issued by the Executive Branch, among which Decrees No. 297/2020, No. 325/2020 and No. 355/20206 were included.
https://www.ohchr.org/sites/default/files/Documents/HRBodies/SP/COVID/States/Argentina1.pdf
Three months after the declaration of the sanitary emergency, on June 7, 2020, at the national level, the restriction measures began to be relaxed in order to achieve the recovery of the highest possible degree of normality in terms of economic and social functioning, establishing geographical zones that would go from social, preventive and mandatory isolation to social, preventive and mandatory distancing (hereinafter, DISPO) due to the decrease in the levels of virus circulation and number of contagions2. In this sense, almost all the provinces of the country were enabled to move to the new stage of social, preventive and obligatory distancing3, allowing new activities and reducing both internal and entry controls to their territories. https://amnistia.org.ar/wp-content/uploads/delightful-downloads/2021/04/0504_Amnist%C3%ADa-informe-anual-pandemia-2.pdf
Australia
A number of Australian states, territories, and cities have implemented lockdowns in response to the pandemic. The country entered a general nationwide lockdown on 23 March 2020 during the first wave of the pandemic, which was lifted on 15 May 2020."Australia's biggest state to ease coronavirus lockdown from May 15" Reuters 10 May 2020, accessed 31 October 2020
The state of Victoria, particularly its capital city of Melbourne, the country's second most populous city with five million residents, entered an extended lockdown on 7 July 2020 in response to a rapidly growing community outbreak. Initial measures included the closure of all non-essential services, including retail entertainment venues and gyms. Restaurant and bar establishments were permitted to open in take-away and delivery capacities only. Schools and childcare facilities were also ordered to close. Face coverings were made mandatory as of 23 July 2020, with a fine of $200 AUD for non-compliance to those above 12 years of age, although formal exemptions could be acquired. Initially scheduled to last six weeks, restrictions were tightened further on 2 August after cases continued to grow, including a ban on travel further than a five kilometre (3 mile) radius from place of residence, a nighttime curfew of 8pm to 5am, a one-hour limit on outdoor exercise, a one-person per day limit on shopping for essentials, and public gatherings limited to a maximum of two people. Restrictions were progressively eased as the case rate declined, and were completely lifted on 28 October. With a total duration of 112 days, the Victorian lockdown was at the time the longest continuous period of COVID-19 lockdown globally as of October 2020. The lockdown resulted in the state recording zero active cases of COVID-19 in November 2020.
Victoria entered its fourth lockdown on 28 May 2021 in response to an outbreak of the Delta variant. Originally scheduled for seven days, the lockdown was extended to two weeks and lifted on 10 June. Another outbreak of the Delta variant saw Greater Sydney enter lockdown on 26 June 2021, scheduled to last until 16 July, but extended by two weeks on 14 July then until 28 August and the end of September 2021. Combined with snap lockdowns declared in Brisbane, Perth, and Darwin, more than 12 million people were in lockdown across Australia on 29 June 2021.
Brief "snap lockdowns" in response to new clusters, particularly of the Alpha, Beta, and Delta variants, have been implemented at various times across the country.
Metropolitan Melbourne's 6th lockdown ended in October 2021, with the city spending among the longest amounts of time spent in lockdown in the world.ABC Australia, however conducted a fact check which cast doubt on the veracity of this claim given the limited data available and lack of comparators.