KYIV, Aug 2 – The Delta strain of coronavirus may shave off between 0.4% and 0.6% of Ukraine’s GDP per months if the government decides to declare another lockdown, the National Bank of Ukraine said Monday.

There are no plans by the government to declare the lockdown, but the Health Ministry is concerned about the growing number of new cases.

"Losses from a possible lockdown due to the spread of the Delta variant of coronavirus in Ukraine are estimated at 0.6% of annual GDP if it lasts for a month,” the NBU said in the report.

“If only the quarantine of the red zones is applied, the losses are reduced to 0.4% of GDP for each month of additional restrictions," the NBU said.

The spread of new mutations of the coronavirus, in particular, the Delta variant, threatens another wave of morbidity and increased quarantine in the coming months, according to the NBU.

As of Monday morning, 265 new cases of the coronavirus (COVID-19) disease were recorded in Ukraine, 176 people recovered, and four people died, the Ministry of Health reported.

"Over the day on August 1, 2021, some 265 new confirmed cases of COVID-19 were recorded in Ukraine [including 11 children, and one health worker]. Also over the past day: 385 people were hospitalized, four people died, and 176 people recovered," the Ministry of Health reported.

The NBU did not change the assessment of the impact of quarantine restrictions in the first half of 2021, since the baseline scenario was being implemented: quarantine of the "red" zones in the second half of March and April, as well as easing restrictions from May.

"Thus, the impact of quarantine restrictions on annual GDP in the first quarter is estimated at 0.2 pp less (0.2 pp less for January and 0.1 pp less for March quarantine, the cumulative impact quarterly less than the amount of contributions due to rounding), in the second quarter –0.4 p.p. less, and in total (together with January and March) – about 0.6-0.7 p.p. less," the NBU said. (om/ez)