Almost two weeks after the start of the Gillamoos in Abensberg and nine days after the political morning pint there, the corona incidence in the Kelheim district exceeded the 1000 mark. On Wednesday, the Robert Koch Institute reported a value of 1075.5. That is three and a half times the value a week ago and the highest value in all of Germany.
However, incidence figures currently only provide a very incomplete picture of the number of infections. Experts have been assuming for some time that there will be a large number of cases not recorded by the RKI – mainly because by far not all infected people have a PCR test done. Only positive PCR tests count in the statistics. In addition, late registrations and transmission problems can lead to the distortion of individual daily values.
There are currently six Bavarian districts and cities among the ten highest incidences nationwide. All of them have at least a temporal connection with folk festivals. Rosenheim city and district are in third and fifth place nationwide with 776.8 and 560.5 respectively. The autumn festival there ended on September 11th. Erding is in fourth place with 592.6 – the folk festival there lasted until September 4th. Weißenburg-Gunzenhausen with 500.4 and Eichstätt with 495.6 are in eighth and ninth place – and there were also folk festivals relatively recently.
The connection between the festivals and the high incidences has not been clearly proven, but it is obvious. Other folk festivals such as the Erlangen Bergkirchweih or the Gäubodenfest in Straubing had also brought massive increases in the incidence. After a while, however, the numbers fell again. Larger overloads of clinics were not known.
In addition, not every folk festival entails a sharp increase in the number of corona. For example, the autumn plärrer in Augsburg from August 26 to September 11 has so far not caused any significant fluctuations in the incidence there. The Gillamoos lasted from September 1st to 5th, the highlight was the political morning pint on September 5th with pithy sayings in the beer tent.