LIVE | Five days of quarantine for EU travelers to Italy | Inland

Read the latest news below:

• AstraZeneca vaccine new name
• ‘Crustacean, mink or cat transmitted coronavirus to humans’
• 6824 postieve coronatests, highest number of patients in hospitals since the end of January

12.23 – Germany announces stricter controls in border areas

Germany will increase checks on travelers in border areas. The authorities want to check more intensively whether people coming to Germany have a negative corona test with them, said Interior Minister Horst Seehofer, according to German media.

“No matter where you come from, be it Poland, France or Denmark, everyone should expect a check,” the minister warned. Germany had border traffic there severely restricted earlier this year due to an outbreak of the South African corona variant.

12.07- Quarantine for EU travelers to Italy

Travelers going to Italy from EU countries must be quarantined for five days shortly after arrival. The measure will apply to both residents and visitors, according to a source at the Ministry of Health in Rome.

Health Minister Roberto Speranza would announce the commitment later in the day. It is not yet clear when it will take effect and how long it would last.

Everyone who arrives must submit a negative corona test and another after the five-day quarantine. An exception can be made in the case of ‘proven necessity and urgency’. The measure appears to be primarily intended as a discouragement against holiday trips. The quarantine and testing obligation already applies to travelers from many non-EU countries.

Strong corona measures are in place in much of Italy to combat the third wave of infection. A three-day Easter lockdown will apply across the country from Saturday.

8.58 – Assad recovered after corona infection

Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad and his wife have recovered from their coronavirus infection. They have now tested negative again and are resuming their normal activities, according to the Syrian state news agency.

7.02 – vaccines are no longer effective within a year

The majority of 76 epidemiologists from 28 countries expect that the coronavirus will mutate within a year to such an extent that most current vaccines are no longer effective. Two thirds of them estimate this in a survey conducted by the so-called People’s Vaccine Alliance, which includes Oxfam Novib and Amnesty International.

Nearly three-quarters of those polled said sharing patents and knowledge could increase global vaccination coverage. This is important, according to the respondents, because 88 percent of them expect persistently low vaccination coverage in many countries to make vaccine-resistant mutations more likely to occur.

The People’s Vaccine Alliance, a coalition of more than 50 organizations, warns that at the current rate, only 10 percent of people in most poor countries may be vaccinated next year. The alliance calls on governments to do everything they can to make vaccines a ‘public good’.

The Dutch epidemiologist Amrish Baidjoe, affiliated with the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, sees a problem arising differently. Despite promises that have been made, nothing has yet come of the fair distribution of vaccines. If we can vaccinate ourselves in the West, but not in poorer countries, then we have a problem worldwide. Scaling up the production of vaccines is now essential and for that pharmaceutical companies should share their patents and knowledge.

According to SME leader Jacco Vonhof, we will not recover from the corona crisis until 2024, he says in a new podcast Matter of Cents:

6.35 – Hospitals do not seem to be able to scale up to 1,700 ic beds

The plan to scale up to 1,700 intensive care beds in the event of a crisis seems unfeasible, several hospitals tell the AD. IC doctors say they fear not getting enough hands on the bed, while the third wave of corona infections is advancing.

Diederik Gommers, chairman of the Dutch Intensive Care Association (NVIC), also confirms that this will be difficult. “There are concerns about capacity on many ICs, that’s right. And if all 75 ICs in the Netherlands can deliver two, five or ten less beds than agreed, you have a problem. ”

Gommers does not dare to mention an exact number of beds. The NVIC will make an inventory this week

6.30 – RIVM: more than 50,000 new corona cases

The number of new corona cases is on the rise again. About 52,000 infections were probably diagnosed in the past week. That is 10 to 15 percent more than in the week before. It would be the highest weekly figure since January 5.

The National Institute for Public Health and the Environment (RIVM) will provide the exact number on Tuesday. Last week, the institute reported that it had registered 46,005 new cases in a week. That was more than 16 percent more than the week before. On average, this amounted to 6,572 reports per day.

In the six days after that update, 45,994 infections have already been discovered. That is an average of 7,666 cases per day. On Saturday, RIVM reported more than 8,800 positive tests, the highest number since January 7.

In the weekly figures, the RIVM also reports on Tuesday how many corona patients were admitted to hospitals last week (last week 1441, of whom 313 in intensive care) and how many deaths were reported (last week 223). The reproduction number currently stands at 1.08. That means the virus is still spreading.

The RIVM will also report on Tuesday how many people have been vaccinated so far. Last week the counter stood at nearly 1.5 million people vaccinated. Of them, more than 600,000 people had already received the second dose, which should protect them against the corona virus at least for the time being. In the past week, vaccination with the AstraZeneca vaccine has resumed after a puncture break.

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