According to information available on the Government website https://covid19estamoson.gov.pt/, the Council of Ministers included the reopening of bars, "subject to the rules of restoration", in the first phase of the plan for the gradual lifting of restrictions that it approved on 29 July.

Official source from the Presidency of the Council of Ministers explained to Lusa that the bars will have to work with the rules of limitation of capacity and occupation of the spaces imposed to the restaurants.

Thus, bar clients will have, for example, to remain seated and limits on the number of persons per table will have to be respected, said the same source.

This information corrects that which was initially disclosed at the end of the Council of Ministers and presented by Prime Minister António Costa, according to which bars would remain closed during the first phase of lifting restrictions that begins next Sunday.

According to information made available on the Government portal dedicated to the pandemic, "the restaurants and similar establishments" will, on 1 August, be able to be open until 2am and with "the rule of a maximum of 6 people per table inside or 10 people on the terraces", extending to the entire territory of the continent the obligation for indoor customers to present a digital certificate of vaccination or a negative test to Covid-19 on Fridays after 7pm, on weekends and on holidays.

"Bars and other drinking establishments without entertainment may operate, subject to the rules established for the catering sector and similar, provided they observe the rules and guidelines in force and those specifically drawn up by the Directorate-General for Health," specifies the information available on the same 'site'.

In phase three of the plan approved by the Council of Ministers, in October, the bars "will reopen their usual activity upon presentation of the EU Digital Certificate or a test with a negative result", informs the Government.

It will also be in this third phase that nightclubs will reopen, with the same rules as bars.

The three new phases of lifting the restrictions in place because of the pandemic are linked to the vaccination rate expected in the coming weeks: 1 August (57 percent population vaccinated), 5 September (71 percent) and October (85 percent).

The Prime Minister announced that the measures will now have a national dimension, and there will no longer be restrictions depending on the situation of each county.