Coronavirus: Germany imposes a curfew

From this midnight begins the first night curfew in Germany. The European country has confirmed more than 250 deaths from covid-19 in the past day and has more than 81,000 people killed since the start of the pandemic.

According to the law approved by the German parliament yesterday, regions that detect more than 100 cases per 100,000 inhabitants per week must impose a curfew between 10 p.m. and 5 a.m., closure of leisure centers, shops and suspension of sporting events.

Currently, more than 330 of the country’s 400 districts exceed this level of incidence, according to the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) of Virology. The cities with the highest contagion rates are Berlin, Munich, Hamburg, Cologne, Stuttgart, Frankfurt and Bonn, the most populous in the country. The institute also clarified that more than 27,000 cases of covid-19 and 265 deaths from the virus were reported on the last day. For seven days, the incidence rate was 164 cases per 100,000 population, with more than 299,000 active cases.

The regulations also provide that in regions where the same contagion rate is greater than 165 cases, face-to-face lessons must be suspended and distance education must be switched. In addition, from 100 cases per 100,000 inhabitants, it is mandatory that students be tested twice a week.

People-to-people contact will also be limited, which will only be possible between people living together and at most one other person, apart from children under the age of 14. Non-essential businesses cannot allow entry to customers who test negative for covid-19 and have a pre-appointment. If the incidence rate exceeds 150 cases, customers will only be able to pick up products ordered in advance.

Health Minister Jens Spahn described the law as an important instrument that establishes a unitary framework and is valid until June 30. In his Twitter account, Spahn spoke of the various tools available to the country to fight the pandemic. “The more than 15,000 test points across the country help take slow opening actions when infection numbers are lower. Thus, bridges will be built until the moment when we can offer vaccination to everyone “He wrote on the social network.

“But the current situation is still serious. It is not enough to stabilize the numbers, but they must be lowered considerably. Therefore, to break the third wave, we need another joint effort. Reducing contacts and mobility: this is more than ever the case ”added Minister Spahn.

For his part, the vice-president of the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) of virology, Lars Schaade, warned not to lower the guard in care because if the incidence seems to have stabilized, it is still too much. high. “The contagion figures do not seem to be increasing so steeply at the moment, which is good news, and the weekly incidence has been hovering around 160 for the past few days and thus stabilizing at a high level.” Schaade said at a press conference to analyze the current epidemiology in the European country.

According to Schaade, this stabilization may be due to restrictive measures that have been applied in some federal states, closing schools at Easter. The fact that many people choose not to travel while on vacation also contributes to reduced mobility. “However, the numbers are still too high, they are not growing so dizzyingly, but unfortunately they are not decreasing either”, he warned.

According to the Robert Koch Institute report, more than 5.7 million people (6.9% of the population) have received both doses of the vaccine and about 18 million people (21.6% of the population) have received the first dose.

According to the register of the German Interdisciplinary Association for Intensive Care and Emergency Medicine (DIVI), more than 5,000 patients with covid-19 are currently hospitalized in intensive care units, of which 2,840 require mechanical breathing .

Source: page 12

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