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“Austria was the first country to shorten the quarantine period from 14 to 10 days,” Health Minister Rudi Anschober (Greens) said yesterday. He understands anyone who wants a shorter quarantine period, but “scientific evidence is needed first.” All EU countries would be waiting, research centers like the Robert Koch Institute are already working on it. VP Club President August Wöginger agreed. Understand Haberlander’s concerns. But he also supports Anschober here, because such a shortening must have a scientific basis.
Today, Anschober will present a new testing strategy to general practitioners, who will be able to detect corona infections using rapid tests in the future. Rapid antigen tests, which have already been used as a test in Vienna, are now also included in the revised version of the “Austrian SARS-CoV-2 Test Strategy”. Areas of application include testing of symptomatic persons in general offices, in hospital outpatient clinics, in schools, and in nursing homes and nursing homes. However, these tests do not replace the conventional PCR test.
- On the live stream: nachricht.at will broadcast the press conference live from 12 noon:
The proposal by crisis advisor and Red Cross commander Gerry Foitik not to test K1’s contacts that are already in quarantine, Anschober rejected. It has an added value for those affected to know if they are infected. The Health Minister advocated for uniform rules across the EU. This is the only way to make travel advisories comparable.
Constitutional lawyers recently declared that interventions in the private sector to contain the corona virus were legally possible. Anschober and Wöginger spoke out in favor of leaving the private private sector and not regulating everything legally.
The real purpose of yesterday’s press conference was to kick off nursing reform. Anschober announced that there should be 100,000 additional nurses by 2030. The goal is to achieve this, among other things, through new nursing apprenticeships and through retraining within the AMS labor foundations.
SPÖ boss wants antigen testing for nursing home visitors
After rapid antigen testing has been part of the revised version of the “Austrian SARS-CoV-2 test strategy” since last week, the head of the SPÖ, Pamela Rendi-Wagner, asked the government on Wednesday to obtain reliable evidence centrally. In principle, Rendi-Wagner welcomed this step: it would be correct to use rapid antigen tests in addition to the PCR method, from his point of view these would also be necessary for visitors to nursing homes.
“Only the most reliable rapid tests that have been thoroughly controlled by experts are allowed to be used. For this, the Minister of Health must set strict quality criteria,” demanded Rendi-Wagner, referring to the criteria of sensitivity and specificity. Reviews must be performed by experts and a list of reliable tests must be established with the Ministry of Health. Second, centralized acquisition is necessary to avoid the proliferation of different and unreliable tests.
As a third point, he named applications that had already been defined in the test strategy, such as hospitals, schools, as well as nursing homes and retirement homes, but expanded them to include large events. “These rapid tests should also be used for nursing home visitors,” Rendi-Wagner says. This could counteract the isolation of older people and people in need of care, as is the case in Germany. “In Germany, according to media reports, the health minister is planning up to nine million rapid antigen tests per month. Converted to Austria, that would be 30,000 rapid antigen tests per day. What is the scope of the planning Anschober and how many tests are obtained centrally? “
Rendi-Wagner rejects Rotkreuz managing director Gerry Foitik’s proposal to stop testing contact persons for K1 who have had close contact with infected people but are not developing any symptoms. That would be “bleaching health statistics,” he said Tuesday night on ORF’s “ZiB 2”.
- Video: SPÖ boss Pamela Rendi-Wagner in the “ZiB 2” conversation about the new measures crowns:
