Tuesday, December 21, 2021
Update
Big New Year’s party is canceled
The federal and state governments have decided
Shortly before the federal-state summit, the Robert Koch Institute is calling for maximum contact restrictions for Germany. Federal Chancellor Scholz and the Prime Ministers do not accept this vote. Nevertheless, the resolutions offer many hardships even for those who have been vaccinated: A big New Year’s break, for example, is canceled.
Despite the falling number of cases, Chancellor Olaf Scholz has prepared people in Germany for a sharp increase in corona infections with the new Omikron variant. Omikron will cause the number of infections to rise massively, said Scholz in the evening after a conference of the Prime Ministers (MPK) of the federal and state governments in Berlin. The fourth corona wave is slowly receding due to the corona measures decided in November. But unfortunately the fifth wave is already building up. The federal and state governments decided to tighten the following rules from December 28th:
- In order to contain the dreaded omicron wave Also vaccinated and convalescent contact restrictions accept. From the December 28th they are supposed to hold their private gatherings a maximum of ten participants restrict. “This upper limit applies to private meetings both indoors and outdoors,” says the resolution that ntv has received. Children up to the age of 14 should be exempt from this.
- Take one unvaccinated person attend a meeting, apply to the Meeting in total the contact restrictions for unvaccinated people: they are allowed to participate People in your own household and a maximum of two people another budget, it says in the resolution.
- Clubs and discos have to close after Christmas. Supraregional sports, cultural and similar Major events, in particular soccer games take place no later than December 28th without a spectator instead of.
- the Vaccination campaign want the federal and state governments to continue running over the holidays, practices and vaccination centers should remain open between the years. Should be by the end of January another 30 million vaccinations be administered. The new rules are supposed to be “nationwide uniform minimum standards”.
- When introducing a general compulsory vaccination are pushing the federal states up to speed and asking the Bundestag and the federal government for a schedule and concrete preparations. “The appearance of the Omikron variant increases the urgency of the introduction of a general vaccination requirement for February 2022, which was envisaged by the resolution of December 2, 2021,” the resolution says.
- The federal and state governments want on January 7th get together again. Until then, the Federal Government should propose further concrete measures and coordinate them with the Expert Council.
Critical infrastructure: review pandemic plans
The government’s Corona Expert Council warned in a statement on Sunday of the serious consequences of an unprecedented spread of the Omikron virus variant. Given the expected “new dimension” of the pandemic, the scientists also called for preventive protection for the critical infrastructure. This means, for example, hospitals, the police, fire brigade and electricity and water supply. In the draft resolution, the operators of such infrastructure are requested to immediately review their respective operational pandemic plans.
The federal and state governments called on citizens to celebrate the Christmas holidays “responsibly”. A test should be carried out before private meetings. In this way, Christmas can be celebrated “together and safely”. The MPK reminded the already decided meeting and fireworks ban on New Year’s Eve in busy places.
The resolutions are not enough for Baden-Württemberg and Saxony
At no point did the MPK follow the more far-reaching proposals published by the Robert Koch Institute that morning in its resolutions. Shortly before the federal-state consultations, the RKI had demanded maximum contact restrictions, and immediately. From a “technical point of view”, Germany’s highest epidemic authority recommended the immediate closure of restaurants and the extension of the Christmas holidays for daycare centers and schools. The new expert council of the federal government had previously warned of the danger of an “explosive spread” of the Omikron variant.
The states of Baden-Württemberg and Saxony stated in a protocol note that they did not consider today’s Corona resolutions to be far enough. However, they did not refer to the RKI, but to the Federal Government’s Expert Council. The resolutions “do not guarantee sufficient capacity to act” in order to cope with the worsening situation that the Expert Council had forecast. Because of Omikron, Baden-Württemberg demanded that the Bundestag re-establish the epidemic emergency.