From Friday: Mask requirement all over Austria in supermarket, bank, post office

The government announces that entry into Austria from risk areas will only be permitted with a negative PCR test. The home quarantine should be more strictly controlled and the test system improved.

“Let’s pull ourselves together again if necessary.” Chancellor Sebastian Kurz (ÖVP) made this appeal to the citizens on Tuesday at a press conference with Vice-Chancellor Werner Kogler, Minister of Health Rudolf Anschober (both Greens) and Minister of the Interior Karl Nehammer (ÖVP) . Because: “It would be absurd” to restrict the everyday life of Austrians “more than necessary”. At the same time, it would be “wrong to not intervene if necessary,” said the head of government. The latter is currently the case. Therefore, turquoise green decided to “tighten” the protective measures against the corona virus.

Concrete:

• From Friday onwards, the requirement for masks throughout Austria will be reintroduced in supermarkets, bank and post branches and in food retailing. So far, mouth-nose protection has had to be worn in public transport, events in closed rooms, trade and public fairs, pharmacies, for services and demonstrations.
• Most of the infections are related to other countries, so there should be “aggravation” at the borders, said Kurz. Concrete: Also from Friday, entry from risk areas is only allowed with a negative PCR test. This must come from certified laboratories and must not have been more than 72 hours ago. The list of risk areas (see info box below) is being continuously evaluated.
• All border controls are now carried out together with the health authorities. The Heimquarantäne will be monitored more closely, but an ankle bracelet for people in quarantine is not planned, Nehammer emphasized.
• Services in free churches are to be reduced to a minimum, as various cluster infections with the Sars-CoV-2 pathogen have recently occurred.

• The Test system should be improved and faster. “Required tests”, Anschober said, are not being considered.

The reason for the “discretionary decisions”, as Kurz called the tightening: In the past few weeks, the self-imposed “magic threshold of a three-digit number of new infections every day” had been exceeded, said Kurz. Although there are currently under 100 newly registered cases per day, this is unlikely to remain so. Yes, the situation was expected, which is why he had said weeks ago that mouth-nose protection “should not be thrown away, we will still need it”. Now this situation has occurred.

The Chancellor announced that they would continue to work in the sense of an accordion: “Loosen, if possible, undo the loosening, if not otherwise possible.”

Fall with traffic lights and more “risk awareness”

Kogler added that turquoise green is about preventing a second lockdown in larger areas. This is done by wearing a mouth and nose protector and maintaining a minimum distance of around one meter. Anschober once again spoke of the “worst pandemic in a hundred years” that one is currently experiencing. And: “This is becoming more and more reality,” he referred to countries in the Western Balkans, where there are currently strong increases in Covid 19 cases.

Austria is still far from such high numbers, as are the highs reached in March and April so far. But: One has to “raise the risk awareness” within the population again, also because one regularly observes regional clusters, like recently in Upper and Lower Austria as well as in Vienna. At the same time “we have to get even faster with the tests in some federal states”, emphasized Anschober and announced corresponding work discussions.

In the Summer Council of Ministers, Turquoise-Green would like to set up a traffic light system that will quickly show where there are more and where there are fewer corona cases in Austria – and how to deal with them. Appropriate guidelines are to be decided in August and a trial run will take place shortly thereafter. The associated legal “basic requirements” are to be decided in the course of September.

However, the top of the government did not provide a concrete answer as to how long the tightening measures that were now to be imposed and what stages would follow thereafter. In short: “We are all not clairvoyants.”