Germany plans stricter rules in gastronomy

Germany wants to tighten rules with a view to the rapid spread of the variant of the Omikron virus. This came from a draft of the Prime Minister’s conference available today to Reuters news agency.

For example, nationwide and regardless of the infection rate, access to catering services for vaccinated and convalescent people should only be possible through daily testing. Only those who are reinforced are the exceptions to the rule. It is not clear when the rules will be applied.

Gastronomy “problem zone”

In the draft agreed between the German Chancellery and the states of North Rhine-Westphalia and Berlin, January 15 was proposed. The reason given is that masks cannot be worn permanently in restaurants, so that the highly contagious variant can be transmitted easily especially there.

German Health Minister Karl Lauterbach (SPD) justified the move yesterday evening by the fact that gastronomy was a “problem area”, where one often sat for hours without a mask. Hotel and restaurant operators criticized the plans. The mass 2-G-Plus would be a “disaster”.

Medical Association warns of bottlenecks in PCR tests

Germany’s largest medical association, Marburger Bund, has warned of bottlenecks in PCR tests. “The Omikron formula will also lead to more infections among laboratory workers,” said Susanne Juna, head of the German Newspapers Editorial Network (RND). It is therefore expected that Germany’s PCR testing capabilities will soon be available only “to a limited extent”. This can already be seen in other countries.

According to the German Ministry of Health, there is currently a capacity to perform 2.4 million PCR tests per week. In contrast, Vienna Mayor Michael Ludwig announced that next week Vienna will have a PCR testing capacity of 3.5 million tests per week.