The nationwide seven-day incidence is currently 201.1. Four federal states are above it: Saxony, Thuringia, Bavaria and Baden-Württemberg. Most of them have only recently tightened their corona measures, but 2G applies across the board in only one.
For the German corona policy, it is Groundhog Day again: Unsurprisingly, the federal and state governments are surprised to find that the number of infections increases with the beginning of winter.
The political corona paralysis is less due to a power vacuum between the incumbent and future federal government, but rather the fear of a minority, but also the distribution of competencies between the federal and state governments. In principle, it works like this: The federal government lays down the legal basis, the states are responsible for the specific rules. This has led to a patchwork of similar but different warning levels.
However, the countries do not have access to some areas. According to the Baden-Württemberg state government, mandatory vaccination for employees in old people’s and nursing homes would have to be introduced nationwide.
Whether it makes sense to introduce a national 2G regulation, as Bavaria’s Prime Minister Markus Söder called for on Monday morning on Deutschlandfunk, is controversial. What is certain is that no federal state is prevented from adopting such rules itself. Most of the countries with the highest incidences have already done so, at least in part, including Söder’s own state.
Here is an overview of the regulations in the four countries with the currently highest number of cases:
2G has been in effect in Saxony since today
A corona protection ordinance has been in effect in Saxony since today, which defines 2G across the board: Only those who have been vaccinated or recovered have access to indoor restaurants, cultural and leisure facilities and football stadiums. FFP2 masks are compulsory in buses, trains and taxis. The reason for the drastic measures: The Free State has the lowest vaccination rate in Germany, the highest seven-day incidence and the most corona deaths per 100,000 inhabitants.
Anyone who has contact with patients in health care facilities and who is not vaccinated must now be tested daily for corona in Saxony – this is only “urgently recommended” to those who have been vaccinated. Retirement and nursing home employees must tell their employer whether they are vaccinated.
The Saxon Corona Protection Ordinance is based on a combination of a seven-day incidence and bed occupancy in normal and intensive care units. The so-called advance warning level was reached in Saxony last Friday. This means, for example, that a maximum of ten unvaccinated people over the age of 14 may take part in private celebrations. The mask requirement in schools from grade 5, which should actually be abolished, therefore continues to apply. In Saxony, the pre-warning level is followed by the overload level.
With the exception of Saxony, 2G has not yet been fully applicable in any federal state. Hamburg introduced 2G as an option model in the summer, other federal states followed suit later, including Berlin. On Sunday, the local health senator Dilek Kalayci told the “Tagesspiegel” that her authority was preparing 2G.
“3G plus” is sufficient in Thuringia
Thuringia’s Corona Ordinance was last revised at the end of October. In the ranking of the seven-day incidence, the state is in second place, as is the number of corona deaths per 100,000 inhabitants. Among the fully vaccinated, the country ranks third from the bottom. The regional values are also so high that since today – with the end of the autumn holidays in Thuringia – tests are mandatory in schools in all districts and urban districts. Unlike in Saxony, elementary school students also have to wear masks in class.
Since warning level 3 has been in effect in all districts and urban districts of the country for a few days, 2G or “3G plus” are mandatory in restaurants and at events – 3G plus means that a simple quick test is no longer enough to be considered tested. A negative PCR test is now required for this.
Bavaria is satisfied with “3G plus” in gastronomy
In Bavaria, the state with the third highest seven-day incidence and the fifth worst rate of those fully vaccinated, the corona traffic light has turned red today. Red is reached when more than 600 intensive care beds are occupied by corona patients in Bavaria – loud Divi intensive register As of Monday afternoon, 611 Covid 19 patients are being treated in the state, 324 of them are being invasively ventilated.
The red level, which was only sharpened on November 3rd, comes into force tomorrow, Tuesday. For facilities and events that were previously accessible according to 3G rules, 2G applies. However, the Bavarian Corona measures make an exception for restaurants, hotels and pensions as well as for body-friendly services: 3G plus applies here.
Also new from tomorrow: In companies with more than ten employees, 3G applies to all unvaccinated employees who have contact with other people during work. A simple quick test twice a week is sufficient. So far, this rule only applied to companies that were subject to 3G, 3G plus or 2G rules, i.e. restaurants, fitness studios, theaters and the like.
Because of the yellow level that is already in force, it has been mandatory to wear a mask in Bavarian schools since the start of school after the autumn break.
Baden-Württemberg is on the way to 2G
In the southwest, stricter rules for unvaccinated people have been in place since Wednesday. Since then, anyone who has not been vaccinated or has recovered has to show a PCR test for numerous leisure activities in closed rooms – for example in restaurants, cinemas, swimming pools, museums or in the canteen. Contact restrictions also apply to unvaccinated people in Baden-Württemberg: meetings are limited to one household and five other people.
Baden-Württemberg is on the “warning level” within its own Corona levels, the second of three levels. The “alert level” applies, among other things, if the occupancy of the intensive care beds in the country reaches 390 or more on two consecutive working days. According to the Divi Intensive Register, 353 Covid 19 cases are currently being treated in Baden-Württemberg. The State Ministry of Health therefore expects that the alert will have to be called shortly.
With a view to current forecasts and model calculations of the University of Freiburg, it is assumed that the alarm level could possibly be called by the end of the week, “in any case” but in mid-November, said a ministry spokeswoman in Stuttgart on Sunday. Then 2G categorically applies in restaurants, canteens and cultural institutions.
In Baden-Württemberg, too, school started again on Monday after the autumn break, but here without a strict mask requirement. This was relaxed in October, before the holidays. Since then, a mask no longer has to be worn on the pitch. On Friday, the school administration was informed by the Ministry of Culture that the mask requirement could be reintroduced “before reaching the alert level”.