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German Chancellor Angela Merkel asked Germans this Saturday to stay home as long as possible given the increase in cases of contagion with the coronavirus in the last three days.
“Please stay as long as possible at home and where you live. I know that in addition to sounding severe, it represents a tough sacrifice, “said the chancellor in her usual weekend video message.
Merkel also asked the Germans to reduce the number of contacts with people they know “inside and outside the house”, and to dispense with “any travel that is not strictly necessary” and “any party that is not strictly necessary.”
The chancellor said that these sacrifices must be made in self-interest and in the interest of society to allow schools and kindergartens to remain open and the economy and jobs to be no longer affected.
Germany, according to Merkel, is in a difficult phase of the pandemic and infections are increasing faster than in the spring.
“How we are going to experience winter and how we are going to celebrate Christmas is something that will be decided these days. We have to do everything possible so that the virus does not spread out of control. Every day is important and everyone can contribute by keeping their distance, respecting hygiene rules and wearing masks, ”he said.
“But it is necessary to go further: science shows us that the spread of the virus is related to the number of contacts we have,” he added.
Germany recorded 7,830 new coronavirus infections on Saturday, marking a new record for the third day in a row, according to virology figures from the Robert Koch Institute (RKI).
This Friday the new cases were 7,334 and last Thursday 6,638. In the last 24 hours, 33 deaths from Covid-19 have been reported.
Since the start of the pandemic, Germany has had 356,387 confirmed infections. 9,767 people died and the RKI estimates that 287,600 overcame the disease.
The current figures are clearly higher than those of spring, when the maximum number of new infections was recorded on March 28 with 6,294, but the data is difficult to compare due to the increase in tests carried out that causes more cases to be discovered. Last week, Angela Merkel met with heads of government from 16 federal states to coordinate measures against the increase in the pandemic.
The most important result of the meeting was the consensus that special measures should be taken when the weekly incidence in a district or city exceeds 50 new infections per 100,000 inhabitants.
In Berlin, where the weekly incidence is 88 infections, it was decreed that bars and restaurants would have to close at 11 p.m., but the courts declared this measure disproportionate.
In addition, the prohibition of hotels to house people in neighborhoods with a weekly incidence of more than 50 infections per 100,000 inhabitants has been questioned by courts in several federal states.
The disease is transmitted by a new coronavirus detected in late December in Wuhan, a city in central China.
The covid-19 pandemic has already claimed more than one million ninety-nine thousand deaths and almost 39 million cases of contagion worldwide, according to a report prepared by the French agency AFP.
