[ad_1]
Federal Minister of Health Spahn visits the IDT Biologika vaccine manufacturer in Dessau-Roßlau. There he commented on the current situation. All the information on the news blog.
According to Johns Hopkins University, nearly 58.5 million people around the world have been infected with the corona virus and more than 1.3 million have died. So far there have been more than 932,367 infected people in Germany. The number of deaths related to a corona infection in the Federal Republic is 14,091 (Johns Hopkins University, as of November 23).
Visiting the manufacturer: Spahn comments on corona vaccines
Federal Health Minister Spahn and Saxony-Anhalt Prime Minister Reiner Haseloff will visit the vaccine manufacturer IDT Biologika in Dessau-Roßlau on Monday. Spahn commented on the crown situation at a press conference. According to the minister, he sees Germany “on the right track” to get out of the pandemic and hopes that the first vaccines will be approved from December, so the necessary infrastructure is already being prepared with the federal states. This is done in cooperation between the federal government, the federal states, and the medical profession.
But for him it is important that vaccination is an offer: nobody is obliged to get vaccinated. But Spahn expects a huge demand: “I am convinced that when we are past this harsh and difficult Corona winter, the willingness to get vaccinated will also increase.”
Germany will get 30 million doses of vaccines from BioNTech through a national agreement, Spahn explains. After registering with the EU Commission, he expects another 56 million doses of vaccine. “We will probably get up to 100 million cans,” says the CDU politician. IDT Biologika is developing a vaccine that, unlike the active ingredients from Biontech and Pfizer or Moderna, is based on a proven principle. IDT hopes that once all clinical trials have been completed, the vaccine could be approved by the end of 2021.
Reiner Haseloff spoke about the meeting between prime ministers and Chancellor Angela Merkel on Wednesday. Read more about it here.
Günther: Christmas in a small group should be possible
From the point of view of the Prime Minister of Schleswig-Holstein, Daniel Günther, Christmas parties in small groups of up to ten people will also be possible under Corona conditions. “We definitely want to have a set of rules for Christmas that allows for the encounters that many look forward to, with family or friends,” said the CDU politician from the German press agency in Kiel. “I don’t see big parties with 30 people and I don’t consider them responsible.”
On Wednesday, prime ministers discussed new measures to contain the pandemic with Chancellor Angela Merkel (CDU). Meetings of the size already determined should definitely be conceivable, Günther said. “And if there was an eleventh person there for Christmas, no one would control it.” In public space in particular, the state will ensure that the rules are followed, Günther said. “But we also made it clear that it is not the job of the regulatory authorities to check the apartments in Schleswig-Holstein to see if there are ten or twelve people sitting there.”
Next Vaccine Candidate Celebrates Advancement
Another company, the British-Swedish pharmaceutical company Astrazeneca, has presented positive data on a corona vaccine. The vaccine prevents an average 70 percent chance of contracting Covid-19, the company announced Monday based on data from the important phase III trial. Single and double vaccination data were taken into account. According to preliminary data, the effectiveness of the Pfizer / Biontech and Moderna vaccines is around 95 percent for the dual vaccines. The Astrazeneca vaccine can be stored according to the information at refrigerator temperatures of two to eight degrees.
The active ingredient Astrazeneca developed together with the University of Oxford has long been one of the promising candidates: the EU had already ordered up to 300 million doses in advance. In total, several countries have already ordered billions of cans of Astrazeneca. The active ingredient is based on the weakened version of the chimpanzee cold virus.
More than 20,000 criminal cases related to the pandemic
German prosecutors have had much more work to do since the start of the crown pandemic. In total, they had more than 20,000 cases of fraudulent emergency aid from Corona or other crimes related to the pandemic, Sven Rebehn, federal manager of the German Association of Judges, told “Welt”. The administrative courts processed more than 6,000 cases related to Corona.
A relatively large number of proceedings revolve around possible grant fraud. “It’s about the help of Corona or other scams: fake internet shops, fake Corona drugs or inferior masks that are sold as FFP-2,” Rebehn told the newspaper. With 7,500 cases, the researchers recorded the highest figures in North Rhine-Westphalia, followed by Berlin. In the capital, the prosecution has to deal with more than 4,500 cases related to the pandemic and another 1,700 are still in the State Criminal Police Office.
The number of patients with corona in intensive care units continues to increase
In view of the growing number of seriously ill corona patients, intensive care physicians have warned of overloading hospitals. “The situation in intensive care units is reaching a critical point,” said the president of the German Interdisciplinary Association for Intensive and Emergency Medicine (Divi), Uwe Janssens, of the “Rheinische Post”. Politicians have wasted too much time since September. “There are still no clear instructions for hospitals that they should postpone planned interventions and medically non-critical operations.”
This instruction is now absolutely necessary so that hospitals continue to be able to act and, at the same time, financial compensation for lost income is available without bureaucracy and as quickly as possible. “It should not come to the fact that we have to turn down emergencies due to overloaded corona stations,” Janssens said.
According to Divi data, the number of patients increased to 3,709 (as of November 22), 79 more than the day before. 2,132 of them received invasive ventilation. There are currently around 6,650 beds available. A month ago, just over 1,100 patients with Covid-19 were treated in intensive care, two months ago around 290.
Corona virus test in Bolzano: More than 300,000 people have been tested for the corona virus in South Tyrol in the last three days. (Source: Antonio Calanni / AP / dpa)
South Tyrol: a massive test finds more than 3,000 people infected
A massive three-day corona test in the northern Italian province of South Tyrol had a great response and brought to light more than 3,000 infections. On Sunday evening, more than 343,000 citizens of the small Alpine province had a free smear test. As announced by authorities, a total of 3,185 participants (0.9 percent) received a corona positive result after the core phase was completed at 8 p.m.
It was then planned that the South Tyrolese could participate in the campaign for another 72 hours in doctors’ offices and some other locations. The state government wanted to break the second corona wave faster: carriers of the virus who have no idea of their infection must be discovered. They are considered a dangerous source of infection. Governor Arno Kompatscher spoke of an “extraordinary result” in the evening. However, critics complain that the results of rapid antigen tests are not reliable enough.
Read previous news here.
