The leader of Bavaria, Markus Söder, announced that Bavaria will take comprehensive measures to curb the spread of the coronavirus, including the cancellation of all Christmas markets and restrictions on family mixing.
Germany’s largest state, with more than 13 million inhabitants, has one of the lowest vaccination rates in the world Germany It is also one of the countries with the highest hospitalization rate. “The situation is unstoppable and it continues to escalate,” Soder said.
this Cancel the Christmas marketOriginally scheduled to open next week, it will deal a heavy blow to the public and suppliers for the second year in a row. The market is a highlight of the German calendar. It has great economic and social significance and attracts a large number of tourists from home and abroad.
Among other measures, the number of people who can meet in private will be reduced to a maximum of two households with five people, and nightlife venues will be closed. These rules will take effect next Wednesday and will last until December 15.
The store is limited to one customer per 10 square meters of store space, while barbers, driving schools, music schools, sports and cultural activities will be limited to those who can prove that they have been vaccinated or recovered from Covid-19 and have a negative impact on the test results. Restaurants that operate in the same way must close at 10pm.
Soder said: “The most important thing is that people who have not been vaccinated will be affected. Not being vaccinated is a real risk.” He said these measures will be “large-scale control.”
Bavaria’s move comes as neighbouring Austria announced that it will implement a nationwide blockade from Monday and will introduce a national vaccination plan in 2022.
Responding to the words of Austrian Chancellor Alexander Schellenberg, Soder said: “I believe we will not be able to escape the authorization of vaccines for everyone. Otherwise, we will fall into a continuous cycle.”
Earlier, Acting Minister of Health Jens Spahn stated that he could not rule out the possibility of a complete blockade in Germany, but added that he was skeptical of comprehensive vaccine authorization, “because I am worried that this will tear the country apart.”
Bavaria’s decision was made earlier in the day after Lothar Wieler, head of the Robert Koch Institute (RKI), the German disease control agency, issued a warning, saying that the country is in a “state of emergency”. “.
On Friday, RKI reported more than 52,000 new Covid cases. In the following 10 days, the virus level continued to reach record levels not seen during the pandemic so far, with 200 to 300 deaths every day. On Friday, the percentage of the nation’s population that was completely stabbed was slightly less than 68%, far below the 90% required by experts to deal with the more toxic variant of Delta.
Campaigns to encourage booster injections are almost non-existent, and only 4 million injections have been performed so far.
At the same time, 14% of intensive care beds are occupied by coronavirus patients, and more and more hospitals have to move patients to other places.
Weiler suggested canceling large gatherings, closing “hot spots” such as “badly ventilated clubs and bars”, and reducing social contacts.
He said: “We must brake urgently now,” he likened the virus to “an oil tanker heading towards the port wall. If we all work hard, it may only hit the wall from the side instead of hitting the wall and fully open.”
Christian Drosten, chief virologist and coronavirus expert at the Charité Hospital in Berlin, said the virus has not yet reached the “endemic stage” in Germany, just as it is expected to reach it soon in the UK.
in a Time Weekly Interview, He said: “You can see in the UK that its vaccine level is about the same as ours. Unfortunately, the death toll per capita is twice ours. It is now in the’post-infection’ stage, starting in late summer. Natural infections there. Community protection is being created. We don’t have one in Germany because there are too few people recovering. [from the virus] The elderly are not vaccinated enough. If we let the virus spread uncontrollably, if we don’t close the vaccine gap first, it will cause another 100,000 deaths. “
