Powerful earthquake puts Croatia in a coronavirus conundrum

The Croatian capital Zagreb experienced its strongest earthquake in 140 years Sunday, when a 5.3-magnitude tremor was felt in the city and across the Western Balkans.

Buildings were damaged, fires broke out, and multiple people were injured, including a teenager who is reportedly in critical condition, Al Jazeera reports. While the challenge of an earthquake on its own is difficult enough, Zagreb is also dealing — like the rest of the world — with the coronavirus pandemic, which left its citizens in a state of confusion and highlighted the fact that the outbreak doesn't prevent other crises from arising and could indeed exacerbate seemingly unrelated problems.

Initially, Croatia's Interior Minister Davor Božinović told people to remain on the streets out of concern for any aftershocks, but keep a safe distance from each other to avoid any spread of the virus.

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Croatia currently has 206 confirmed cases of COVID-19 and one death. "We have two parallel crises that contradict each other," Prime Minister Andrej Plenković said. Božinović echoed Plenković, saying, "There are rules for when there is an earthquake, but when there is an earthquake at the same time when there is a global pandemic, then it's a much more complex situation." Read more at Al Jazeera.