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The new steps are the most complicated since the spring and adhere to additional restrictions in Spain and Italy aimed at reducing the spread of the virus and alleviating tension in hospitals.
By Matina Stevis-Gridneff
BRUSSELS – France announced a momentary national shutdown and Germany reached the breaking point of one on Wednesday, testing its populations exhausted by the pandemic as they tried to save it from a new wave developing coronavirus infections from overwhelming hospitals and hopes of economic recovery.
The new measures adhere to serious new restrictions in other European countries, from Belgium to Italy and the Czech Republic. Although they have generally not reached the general blockade of spring, a “light blockade,” the Germans called it, posed the ghost. of a dark winter of relative contention, leaving the leaders of Paris and Berlin pleading with their frustrated audiences to adhere to the new rules.
“I know the tiredness and this sense of an endless day that is beyond all of us,” French President Emmanuel Macron said Wednesday in a national speech. “We will have to stick together and united, and not yield to the poison of division. . This era is difficult precisely because it tests our ability to recover and drive. »
Emphasizing the need for urgent action, he and German Chancellor Angela Merkel have been based on the tough classes learned over the more than 8 months, seeking to keep the parts of the economy and life open considered obligatory or less risky, while completing almost everything else. A more complicated course risked triggering a popular rebellion.
The rise in the pandemic and new blockades affected stock markets in Europe, as in the United States, with primary indices down by about 3% on Wednesday.
From Friday, France will enter a national closure and only schools and businesses will remain open until December 1, while in Germany, new measures will close restaurants, bars, gymnasiums and cultural spaces such as theatres for a month, but exempt schools and shops. .
Just a few months ago, when Italy became the first European country to impose a national blockade in March, restrictions on freedom surprised Europeans who had not experienced anything like this since World War II, but since then curfews and containment have become regular, albeit sporadic. , characteristic of life in Europe, which used them to repel the virus before the summer and then relieved them, triggering the wave of infections of the moment.
The growing number of victims of the virus has made it clear that the course for European governments is shrinking and that they can no longer delay the re-importation of some of the strictest measures, especially if they need to save part of the winter holiday season. .
Spain returned to a state of emergency last week, while on Sunday the Italian government closed restaurants at 6pm in Belgium, where lately the infection rate is the highest on the continent, restaurants closed this month, followed by this month’s museums and gyms. weekend.
But this wave of moments differs significantly from the first. Unlike spring closures, the new set of measures will be unlimited. Most of the recently announced restrictions in European countries have been put in place for about a month, which scientists and policy makers say can act on. like a “breaker. “
And while hospitals fill up at an alarming rate, the mortality rate of this wave is particularly lower than that of the first wave, due to the decrease in the average age of patients and the higher protocols of care of those who are hospitalized.
However, many Europeans are exhausted, emotionally and economically, due to new restrictions on their freedoms after having had an unrestricted movement during the summer.
“We are dealing with two enemies: we are dealing with coronavirus itself and crown fatigue,” European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said in revealing new plans to fight the virus in the European Union. “People are tired of measures,” she said, additionally.
The epidemiology on the continent is terrible. The rate of new infections in Europe has tripled in the last month, exceeding 200,000 a day.
France, Spain, Italy and Britain are among the European countries that reported spikes in new cases, and their mortality rates in months. France reported its death number this week in line with the day since April, while Italy and the UK reported their number since May. .
In France, where the toughest measures were announced on Wednesday, 288 new virus-related deaths were reported in hospitals on Tuesday and 235 deaths in nursing homes in the past 4 days.
The beds of intensive care units in France were partially complete and modeling the spread of the virus indicated that the country’s fitness formula was two weeks away from achieving the same number of hospitalizations as the peak of the first wave. similar situation, “overwhelmed by a momentary wave that we now know will probably be tougher and more fatal than the first. “
Most non-essential businesses in France will close, adding bars and restaurants, and outdoors your home will be strictly limited. Private and public meetings will be prohibited. But schools will remain open. Some economic activities (public services, factories, farms and structure sites) will continue, and restrictions on visits to retirement homes and funerals will not be as strict as in the spring.
In Germany, restaurants and bars will close for a month from Monday, professional sports groups will play in empty stadiums, while theatres, gyms, asylums and spas will remain closed, but supermarkets, Array schools and day care centers will remain open, Chancellor Merkel said on Wednesday.
Merkel, who oversaw a wide range of stimulus measures for businesses and workers suffering, said the government would compensate affected small and medium-sized enterprises by closing up to 75% of losses.
The measures aim to alleviate tension in hospitals in the country, where the number of patients has doubled in just 10 days, and prevent the immediate spread of the virus before the next holiday, which absolutely paralyzes the economy.
Merkel laughed when she predicted last month that if other people didn’t replace her behavior, the country would face 19,000 infections a day at Christmas, but now it looks like that figure will be reached in November.
“In a few weeks we will reach the limits of our fitness system,” Merkel said at a press conference, after reaching an agreement with Germany’s 16 governors on national measures.
“The variety was done with care, knowing that it will be complicated and knowing that many other people have developed tactics to stay safe and act responsiblely,” he said. “But in deciding how to decrease the number of contacts, without affecting the economy and schools, we have made those decisions and they are moderate and politically acceptable. “
While the chancellor was holding a video assembly with the governors on Wednesday, several thousand more people in the entertainment sector marched in central Berlin, denouncing the measures that have left them unemployed since early March.
More and more people protested against the restrictions, and Merkel stated that the arrival of new measures two weeks earlier would have helped, but political acceptance of such an initiative does not exist.
“Look at the protests and the lack of that,” he says. We will have to be prepared to protect these measures, even in court. “
The measures in Germany and France, the two main countries in the region, came after several others approached new blockades in recent weeks and, in some cases, faced a popular backlash.
The Italian government’s announcement of new restrictions this week, which ordered restaurants to close early and cinemas, gyms and theaters to close for a month, was temporarily met with protests. Outside Naples, protesters threw firecrackers, burned trash cans and clashed with police before the protests spread. to other cities, adding Rome and Milan.
On Tuesday, at a turin headquarters, nonviolent protesters placed white tablecloths with plates, cutlery and glasses of wine in the cobblestones, sitting in silence.
Belgium, which suffered extraordinarily in the first wave, this week has become the European country with the rate of contagion in the second. It closed restaurants, bars and cafes, and over the weekend, new measures closed cultural centers, museums and gymnasiums, and brought curfew from 10 p. m. 6 a. m.
The Czech Republic, which gave the impression that it escaped the havoc of the coronavirus in the spring, quadrupled its workload in October, filling hospitals to the brisk. His daily average of deaths over the following week is one of the highest in the world. .
“What happened was predicted, but no one expected it to be within reach,” Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis said, after pointing to a moment of national closure.
The authorities also imposed a curfew on Wednesday that would limit movement after nine o’clock at night and asked their European Union and NATO allies to send a medical corps of workers to help stop the epidemic.
As feared and unsastrous as they may be, additional restrictions are inevitable, given the resurgence of the pandemic, said Peter Piot, a renowned infectious disease specialist.
“In many countries, the scenario is such at this time, with widespread infection in the community, that some degree of blockage is in fact mandatory to suppress the virus and save lives,” he said.
The reports went through Aurelien Breeden in Paris, Melissa Eddy in Berlin, Gaia Pianigiani in Rome, Isabella Kwai in London and Hana de Goeij in Prague.
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