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By AFP 
3h ago
By AFP Bureaus
London, UK – Millions of people in England and Italy will celebrate Christmas under harsh new coronavirus restrictions announced Saturday as Europe battled a winter surge in infections and Switzerland became the latest country to approve a virus vaccine .
Europe has become the first region in the world to exceed 500,000 deaths from Covid-19 since the pandemic broke out a year ago, killing more than 1.6 million worldwide and plunging the world economy into crisis.
Among those who tested positive for coronavirus this week was French President Emmanuel Macron, but his office said on Saturday his condition was stable and his tests were giving reassuring results.
Italy announced on Saturday a new regime of restrictions until January 6 that included limits on people leaving their homes more than once a day, closures of nonessential shops, bars and restaurants and restrictions on regional travel.
“It’s okay for them to ban departures after December 20 if it means traveling safely,” Claudia Patrone, a 33-year-old lawyer, told AFP as she got off a train in Milan.
“I took the exam before leaving, I was locked in my house, I didn’t see anyone. The measure is correct if everyone respects the rules and guarantees safety.”
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson also announced a new “stay home” order for London and south-east England, an area that includes around a third of England’s population, to curb a new strain of the virus that, according to him, it was “up to 70 percent.” more transmissible. “
“With a heavy heart I must tell you that we cannot continue with Christmas as planned,” Johnson told the nation in a televised briefing.
“Unfortunately, when the facts change, you have to change your approach.”
Residents in the affected areas will have to remain locked up until at least Dec. 30, Johnson said, canceling previous plans to temporarily relax virus restrictions during the holiday period so that up to three households can mix.
Europe, the epicenter of the pandemic earlier this year, is once again seeing cases on the rise and officials fear an explosion of infections after the Christmas holidays as families reunite.
A year after the pandemic first emerged in the Chinese city of Wuhan, the rapid deployment of vaccines is now seen as the only effective way to end the crisis and the economically devastating lockdowns used to stop its spread.
Europe is expected to begin a mass vaccination campaign after Christmas after the United States and Britain have started giving injections with an approved vaccine from Pfizer-BioNTech, one of several leading candidates.
Russia and China have also started giving injections with their own domestically produced vaccines.
Swiss regulators gave the green light on Saturday to the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, the 16th country to do so and the first in continental Europe, and immunization will begin in a few days.
“Those who are particularly vulnerable will be given priority,” Health Minister Alain Berset said in a video tweet, namely the elderly and those with pre-existing conditions.
Nation most affected
The United States authorized Moderna’s Covid-19 vaccine for emergency use on Friday, paving the way for millions of doses of a second jab to be shipped to the most affected country in the world.
The United States is the first nation to authorize Moderna’s two-dose regimen, now the second vaccine to be implemented in a Western country after the one developed by Pfizer and BioNTech.
Millions of doses will begin shipping starting this weekend from cold storage sites outside of Memphis and Louisville.
With the United States recording more than 2,500 deaths per day from Covid-19, senior US officials, including Vice President Mike Pence, came forward for the first vaccines on Friday.
Pence’s public inoculation was the most prominent attempt to date to persuade vaccine-skeptical Americans to join a national effort to stop a pandemic that has infected more than 74 million worldwide.
President-elect Joe Biden, who will take office on January 20, announced that he will be vaccinated, also in public, on Monday.
In Europe, Slovak Prime Minister Igor Matovic became the latest high-profile figure to test positive for Covid-19 a week after attending a European Union summit in Brussels.
The summit is believed to be where Macron also contracted the virus. Macron’s diagnosis on Thursday led a series of European leaders and French officials to rush into self-isolation.
Macron, who works in self-isolation in an official residence on the outskirts of Paris, “continues to present the same symptoms of the Covid-19 disease (fatigue, cough, stiffness),” said a brief statement this Saturday, signed by his doctor.
In Australia, a cluster of cases on Sydney’s northern beaches grew to 38, and residents were ordered to stay home from Saturday night for essential reasons.
The premier of the state of New South Wales, Gladys Berejiklian, pleaded with the more than five million residents of Sydney to stay in their homes.
“We hope it gives us enough time to get the virus under control so that we can relax for Christmas and New Years,” he said.
In India, the total number of cases surpassed 10 million on Saturday, the second highest in the world, although the rates of new infections appear to have fallen dramatically in recent weeks.
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