“The number of infections is increasing, as well as the number of COVID deaths and patients in intensive care units, especially in some regions of Germany, where vaccination rates are not as high as in other regions,” Spahn said on Wednesday. Is.” , adding that the speed of administration of booster shots “is not sufficient.”
So far only 66.8% of the country’s population has been fully vaccinated. According to health ministry data, vaccination has been slow in the eastern states of Saxony and Thuringia, where vaccination rates are 59% and 62.2%, respectively.
“The truth is that there will be very few Covid-19 patients in India. [intensive care] If everyone can do that then he’s got the vaccinations,” Spahn said.
He also called for strengthening checks in public places, where only people with proof of vaccination or COVID-19 recovery certificate would be allowed entry.
“It has nothing to do with harassment for vaccination, it is mainly about avoiding the overload on the health system, as we see in Saxony and Thuringia,” he said.
Lothar Weiler, president of the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) – the German federal government agency for disease control and prevention – said at the same press conference, “If we do not act now, this fourth wave will still bring a lot of suffering. People will become seriously ill and die, and the health care system will be heavily burdened.”
pressure on hospitals
The German Hospital Association (DKG) also warned of staff shortages related to COVID-19 on Wednesday.
According to a survey by DKG, 72% of hospitals said that they had fewer staff in intensive care than at the end of 2020 and 86% of those hospitals said that they would not completely replace their intensive care wards due to staff shortage. Won’t change from cannot operate from
Because of that shortage, according to the DKG, there are fewer working hours due to employee resignations and the pressure of the pandemic.
On Wednesday, the state of Baden-Württemberg imposed new Covid-10 restrictions after filling more than 250 intensive care beds for two consecutive days. Residents now must submit a negative COVID-19 test that is no more than 48 hours old to enter restaurants and cinemas.
German government spokesman Stefan Seibert said in another news conference on Wednesday that German Chancellor Angela Merkel was “very concerned” about the decline in hospital capacity.
“What worries her is that in Germany we have over 16 million illiterate adults, over 3 million who are over 60 years old,” he said.
“The pandemic is not, as some might have imagined, in the summer, on shortfall, but it is challenging us now and will do a lot in the coming weeks,” Seibert said.
According to data from the European Centers for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC), the suffering has been intense in Eastern Europe and Russia, which are grappling with rising deaths and vaccine hesitation, with cases coverage rates reaching 24%. .
Experts say differing vaccination rates put Europe’s east and west on two different tracks, but they share rates of rising cases driven by the easing of pandemic restrictions, as economies open up, cold weather Moving people indoors in weather and the highly permeable delta version.
.