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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.
People wearing protective masks emerge from a supermarket with carts full of shopping in Milan on March 8, 2020 as Italy quarantines more than 10 million people around the financial capital Milan and the tourist mecca of Venice for nearly a month to stop the spread of the new coronavirus, COVID. -19. Image: AFP
LONDON – Millions of people in England and Italy will celebrate Christmas under the strict restrictions of the new coronavirus as Europe battles a winter surge that includes a new, more infectious strain.
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.
In England, where a lockdown-weary population had been waiting for a temporary five-day relaxation of virus restrictions over the holiday period, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced a new “stay at home” order for London and south-east England. an area that includes about a third of the country’s population.
The move follows the alarm over the speed at which the virus was spreading and a new strain that Johnson said was “up to 70 percent more transmissible.”
“With a heavy heart I must tell you that we cannot continue with Christmas as planned,” he told the nation at a televised conference on Saturday.
“Unfortunately, when the facts change, you have to change your approach,” he said.
Residents in the affected areas will have to remain locked up until at least Dec. 30, Johnson said, breaking previous plans that would have allowed up to three homes to be mixed up.
Hours later, the Netherlands banned all passenger flights from Britain after finding the first case of the most infectious new strain of virus circulating in the UK.
The ban is in effect from 0500 GMT on Sunday until January 1.
The Netherlands is under a five-week lockdown until mid-January with schools and all non-essential stores closed to stem the rise of the virus.
Italy also announced 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.”
THE HOPE FOR VACCINATION BEGINS
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, which have started pounding with an approved injection of Pfizer-BioNTech, one of several leading candidates.
Russia and China have also started giving injections with their own domestically produced vaccines.
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.
It 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.
MILLION DOSES
Millions of doses will begin shipping starting this weekend from cold storage sites outside of Memphis and Louisville. More than 272,000 people have already been vaccinated with the Pfizer vaccine, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said.
With the country now recording more than 2,500 daily deaths from Covid-19, senior officials, including Vice President Mike Pence, reached out for the first vaccinations 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 would receive the vaccine, 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 have been where French President Emmanuel Macron also contracted the virus. Macron’s diagnosis on Thursday prompted a host of European leaders and French officials to rush into self-isolation.
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 new infection rates appear to have fallen sharply in recent weeks.
Meanwhile, Israel established new rules on the coronavirus, including a requirement that residents returning to the country starting Sunday self-isolate.
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