More than half of the regions in Ukraine may be included in the "red" level of epidemic danger from next week, according to Kyiv School of Economics (KSE).

"Next week, we may already have more than 50% of regions in the 'red' zone. Accordingly, next week we expect the government to decide whether exceeding 50% of regions in the 'red' zone will be the determining criterion for imposing a nationwide lockdown," head of the KSE Center for Health Economics Yuriy Hanichenko said during a press briefing in Kyiv on Thursday.

"From now on, Mykolaiv and Cherkasy regions have shown that the thresholds for entering the 'red' zone have been exceeded, and it is expected that today or tomorrow a meeting of the State Commission on Environmental Safety, Manmade Disaster and Emergency Response will take place, where they will decide to refer these regions to the 'red' zone. It is also necessary to introduce additional restrictions in Vinnytsia region, which has been 'growing in numbers' for a very long time, and in Khmelnytsky region, which has reached one of the highest hospitalization levels in the country," he said.

According to Hanichenko, Rivne, Chernihiv and Ternopil regions may also soon enter the "red" level of epidemic danger. At the same time, the situation in Ivano-Frankivsk region is stabilizing, but there is still the largest number of patients.

In addition, the expert said that Ukraine remains in the top five large European countries with the most critical situation regarding COVID-19. "Over the past three weeks, mortality rate in Ukraine has reached the peak of the previous wave and continues to grow strongly. Over the past three days, we have had absolute maximums in terms of the number of daily deaths," he said.

Hanichenko added that the hospitalization rate has slowed down somewhat, while the number of hospitalizations is a quarter higher than the number of discharged patients.