END OF AUSTRIAN CONTAINMENT ON MONDAY
The re-containment introduced three weeks ago in Austria to fight the Covid-19 pandemic will end on Monday as planned, except for unvaccinated people, the government announced on Tuesday. “We have a positive trend” for the reduction of contamination and we have “agreed to end the containment,” said new conservative chancellor Karl Nehammer.
“The coronavirus is weighing on people. And for many, the limit of what is reasonable is exceeded”, he had estimated during his inauguration the day before, promising to overcome the “divisions” which undermine Austrian society. The unvaccinated, who have not been recently infected with the virus, however, remain subject to confinement.
The roadmap for this gradual reopening must be detailed Wednesday and “we will be as careful as possible”, assured the leader, while the hospital sector remains under tension.
A little more than 4,200 cases of contamination were identified in 24 hours according to figures published Tuesday, against 16,000 cases at the height of the wave in mid-November. But more than 3,000 people are still hospitalized, including 670 in intensive care, the highest figure ever recorded this year.