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WITHTo contain the corona pandemic, the federal government wants to enforce more stringent contact and quarantine restrictions beyond the current partial lockdown. In a draft resolution available to the German Press Agency for the videoconference between Chancellor Angela Merkel (CDU) and the prime ministers of the federal states this Monday, it is said that a large number of infections continue to occur in private and outdoor spaces to the public. For this reason, in this phase of the pandemic, it is important that citizens “go beyond the rules and prohibitions to significantly reduce their private contacts again in the coming weeks.”
Specifically, the federal government requires:
Private meetings:
Private celebrations should initially be avoided entirely until Christmas. Private meetings with friends and acquaintances should be confined to another fixed home. Children and youth should be encouraged to only meet a boyfriend or girlfriend in their spare time. With every cold symptom, and especially with a cough and runny nose, you should go straight home and self-quarantine.
Contact restrictions:
From now on, you are only allowed to stay in public with members of your own household and a maximum of two people from another household. Regulatory authorities sanction violations of these contact restrictions. Party groups in public places, apartments and private facilities are not considered acceptable.
Most infections do not occur in public places.
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Image: dpa
Leisure:
Leisure-related activities and visits to areas open to the public should be completely avoided. Private trips and unnecessary day trips should also be avoided. Unnecessary stays in closed rooms with public traffic and unnecessary trips on public transport should also be avoided.
Vulnerable groups of people:
Visits to the elderly and vulnerable should only take place if all family members are free of symptoms of the disease and have not been at risk for at least a week. Individuals at particular risk will receive discounted FFP2 masks starting in December. To reduce the risk of contagion, the federal government wants to make it possible for this population group to sell 15 of these masks for a small contribution.
With masks in class: sixth graders in Kiel.
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Image: dpa
Schools:
In schools, the use of mouth and nose protection should be mandatory for students of all ages and for teachers on school premises and during classes. Without exception, fixed groups of students must be formed, so the size of the groups in the classrooms must be reduced by half compared to normal operations. There must be a spatial distance between the individual groups. A minimum distance of 1.5 meters must be guaranteed within a class or course. This also applies to the transport of schoolchildren by bus, the range of which will be expanded.
The chancellor and the heads of state government will join forces this Monday afternoon. It is suggested that this date be November 23, but that could still change. There, based on the current infection rate, a decision must be made on what measures will be applied in December, including at Christmas and New Year’s Eve. The partial lockdown that has been in effect since early November will initially run until the end of November. This Monday’s meeting had been scheduled from the beginning in order to establish an intermediate balance. The federal government had already indicated that there could not yet be a relaxation.
Merkel: “Winter will demand a lot from us all”
Merkel put citizens in the mood for the difficult months on Saturday. “The winter ahead will demand a lot from all of us,” said the Chancellor in her video podcast. “The virus will rule our lives for a long time. That also means that we cannot be without worries. ” Leisure facilities and restaurants are currently closed and hotels cannot accommodate tourists.
According to the Robert Koch Institute (RKI), health authorities reported 16,947 new corona infections in Germany on Sunday in one day. That’s 5,514 cases less than the previous day with 22,461 new cases reported within 24 hours. The number of cases registered is usually lower on Sundays, in part because fewer tests are conducted on weekends. Last Sunday, the number of new infections reported was 16,017.
The 7-day incidence recently has not risen as fast as in early November and was 140.4 cases in seven days per 100,000 residents on Friday. The federal government’s goal is to get closer to an incidence of 50. Only then is it possible to retrace the individual contacts of infected people.
How to proceed with schools could become a topic of discussion this Monday. Bavarian Prime Minister Markus Söder (CSU) announced stricter measures on “Bild live” on Sunday. Preliminary consultations reported that there was agreement in principle that schools should remain open for classroom instruction. However, most countries currently do not want to change regulations. Here the fronts have hardened, it was heard.
