Netflix’s original shows and movies production has completely been suspended by the streaming giant due to the rising havoc being caused by the coronavirus.
In a statement to The Verge, Netflix confirmed that they have stopped the production and shooting activities in the US and Canada for two weeks in conjunction with the restrictions from the government.
Netflix said they have paused their production activities “due to government restrictions and health/ safety precautions.”
The content that is going to be affected by this pause in production activities includes The Witcher and Stranger Things as well as Ryan Murphy’s upcoming film The Prom.
Netflix, however, is not the first or the only company to stop media production activities. Disney has already issued a statement declaring they are going to halt their production process for a “short-time.”
Disney’s statement said: “While there have been no confirmed cases of COVID-19 on our productions, after considering the current environment and the best interests of our cast and crew, we have made the decision to pause production on some of our live-action films for a short time.”
Disney further said they will “continue to assess the situation and restart as soon as feasible.”
Warner Bros. has also made it public that they are halting the production of more than 70 of their upcoming shows due to coronavirus situation.
Talking of the scale of the problem corona has become, President Donald Trump has declared the epidemic to be a “national emergency.”
This declaration is not just a bunch of words. It has serious implications.
Top of the list is the fact that the US Government can now access an additional budget of $50 billion to tackle the emergency.
Announcing the emergency, Trump told the US citizens that the “next eight weeks are critical.”
So far, there have been 40 deaths in the US due to corona and the disease has so far infected 1,700 people.
As a part of the emergency relief package, more than 500,000 corona test kits will be made available in the coming weeks.
US House of Representatives’ Speaker Nancy Pelosi said that the government will be giving the people paid sick leave of up to two weeks and paid family leaves of up to three months in order to slow down the spread of the virus.
She further added that the people who don’t have insurance will be tested for free to screen them for coronavirus.
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