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Nasal swab in Berlin
Photo: Kira Hofmann / dpa
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Corona easing in Los Angeles: Cinemas are allowed to reopen
5.30 a.m.:
In the film city of Los Angeles, the cinemas are now allowed to reopen after a forced break for months due to the corona crisis.
With fewer new infections and increased vaccination measures, the health authority announced on Thursday that it would ease the strict requirements for the coming week.
Then movie theaters are allowed to reopen with 25 percent occupancy.
Seats must be reserved in advance, a minimum distance must be maintained.
Last week New York also gave the green light for the restricted opening of the cinemas in the east coast metropolis.
With the beginning of the corona crisis in spring 2020, film operations in Hollywood were largely stopped.
Numerous filming and cinema releases have been postponed.
Awards ceremonies such as the Golden Globe Awards took place virtually.
Several films are in the starting blocks in the coming weeks, including »Godzilla v.
Kong ”,“ Mortal Kombat ”and“ Black Widow ”.
Operators of hotels and restaurants demand opening around Easter
5.25 a.m.:
The German Hotel and Restaurant Association (Dehoga) has called for businesses to open around the Easter holidays.
"At the end of March, the hospitality industry has been in lockdown for seven months since the beginning of the pandemic," said Dehoga CEO Ingrid Hartges of the Düsseldorf "Rheinische Post".
"We demand a lot more speed when vaccinating and testing," she demanded.
From the next federal-state meeting, Dehoga expects a specific timetable as to when and under what conditions restaurants and hotels will be able to receive guests again.
"61 percent of our companies are in favor of opening before Easter," said Hartges.
Around 24 percent "are in favor of opening immediately after Easter on April 6, with a view to the ever decreasing lead time," she added.
An "endless lockdown" is neither a solution for the entrepreneurs nor for the employees, criticized the Dehoga managing director.
"We expect equal treatment with other industries as well as practical and consistent regulations," she told the newspaper.
Brazil again reports over 2,000 corona deaths within 24 hours
5.15 a.m.:
After the most deadly week in the pandemic to date, Brazil recorded more than 2,000 corona deaths in one day for the second day in a row.
According to data from the Ministry of Health in Brasília on Thursday evening (local time), 2233 people died within 24 hours (Wednesday: 2286).
A total of 272,889 people died in connection with Covid-19 in Brazil.
75,412 people were newly infected, bringing the number of people infected with corona in the largest country in Latin America to almost 11.3 million.
Only in the USA and India are the numbers even higher.
Brazil didn't start vaccinating until January.
The health system in many cities has collapsed or is in the process of collapsing.
After the collapse of the health system in the Amazon metropolis of Manaus, the regions in the south and south-east, which have a stronger infrastructure, are now also causing concern.
According to the news portal »G1«, the intensive care units for Covid-19 patients in 53 cities in the state of São Paulo have reached 100 percent capacity.
Local politicians have recognized the seriousness of the situation and recently tightened the measures against the rapid spread of the corona virus.
The state of São Paulo announced a curfew from 8 p.m. to 5 a.m. on Thursday.
The measure applies from next Monday for 15 days.
Association: GPs instead of vaccination centers in the fight against Corona
04.15 a.m.:
According to their association, general practitioners are to immunize completely against Covid-19 instead of vaccination centers.
"You can work through the vaccination appointments that are still booked there, but at the same time the field of vaccinations must finally be left to the resident doctors," said Association President Ulrich Weigeldt of the "Augsburger Allgemeine".
"The practices could start vaccinating right away," he said.
He demanded that the vaccinations in the vaccination centers be phased out and that they be transferred to the doctor's offices as soon as possible.
According to the ministerial recommendation, the vaccination centers are to be supplied with 2.25 million doses per week in April.
Vaccines that are also available should go to practices "as soon as possible".
The Federal Ministry of Health said that a certain minimum weekly amount of vaccine was needed to get started in the practices.
In order to be able to meet the request of the federal states to use their vaccination centers to capacity as before, the practices could probably only start in mid-April.
Weigeldt said the general practitioners were shocked and stunned that "the long overdue start of vaccinations in our practices will continue to be put on the back burner."
"Meanwhile, millions of vaccine doses are lying around unused in cost-intensive vaccination centers, the anonymity of which older people in particular shy away from."
German trade union federation calls for extension of short-time work allowance
4:05 a.m.:
In view of the ongoing corona crisis, the German Trade Union Confederation (DGB) is calling for an extension of easier access to short-time work.
"Corona-related relief for short-time work only applies if it is started by March 31," said DGB boss Reiner Hoffmann of the dpa.
"But what about the companies that, in view of the ongoing problems, first have to send their employees to short-time work?" Hoffmann: "For all of them, we have to extend the options for access to simplified short-time work."
Short-time work is intended to avoid layoffs in the crisis.
The prerequisite for short-time work benefits is that at least 10 percent of the employees in a company are affected.
You must have lost wages of more than 10 percent.
As things stand today, these requirements only apply to companies that started short-time work by March 31.
The instrument should also be at the center of a joint appearance this Friday by Federal Labor Minister Hubertus Heil (SPD) and the chairman of the Federal Employment Agency, Detlef Scheele.
Both want to take stock of »One year Corona« in terms of labor market policy.
The short-time work allowance is 60 percent of the net wage, 67 percent for employees with at least one child.
From the 4th reference month it can be increased to 70 or 77 percent, from the 7th reference month to 80 or 87 percent.
Between February 1 and February 24 alone, the Federal Agency received short-time work notifications for 500,000 people.
In December, 2.39 million people were paid short-time work benefits.
The peak was reached in April last year with almost six million people.
Medical professionals: skipping vaccinations in Denmark can be harmful
3:05 a.m.:
According to a German medical professional, the decision by the Danish authorities to suspend the administration of the AstraZeneca vaccine can do more harm than good.
Blood clots that were occasionally registered after the corona vaccination are very common in seriously ill Covid 19 patients, said Mathias Pletz, director of the Institute for Infection Medicine and Hospital Hygiene at the University of Jena.
By suspending vaccinations in Denmark for two weeks, it is very likely that more people will now contract Covid-19 than without this decision - and about five percent of them will certainly be severe.
As a result, more thromboses could occur.
"The decision probably causes more harm than it prevents potential vaccination complications, which we currently do not even know whether they are vaccination complications at all," said Pletz.
That was an inadequate risk-benefit assessment.
Denmark had decided not to vaccinate anyone with the AstraZeneca corona vaccine for the time being.
The reason given was reports of death and serious illness from blood clots after vaccination.
However, it is not yet possible to determine whether there is a connection between the vaccine and the blood clots, it said.
Norway and Iceland followed Denmark's decision.
Like the European Medicines Agency (EMA), Pletz comes to the conclusion that the rate of thrombosis sufferers after vaccination with the AstraZeneca preparation corresponds to the spontaneous occurrence of this disease in the normal population.
As of March 10, the EMA had recorded 30 cases of "thromboembolic events" in nearly five million people vaccinated with the AstraZeneca vaccine.
Germany does not suspend vaccinations with this preparation.
The responsible Paul Ehrlich Institute (PEI) announced on Thursday evening that from its point of view and the opinion of the EMA, the benefits of the vaccination outweigh the known risks.
Biden plans to have vaccines released for all adults by May
02.05 a.m.:
US President Joe Biden wants to lift the staggering according to vaccination groups in the coronavirus pandemic and have vaccines released for all adults in the USA by May 1 at the latest.
Biden will announce a corresponding order to the states in his first major television address at prime time on Thursday evening (local time), the White House said.
The aim is to "bring the USA closer to normality" by Independence Day on July 4th.
As soon as the vaccines are released to everyone, the government will ensure that every adult can actually receive a vaccination, the White House said.
Among other things, the number of pharmacies and health centers in which vaccinations are administered should be significantly increased.
Biden will also announce that the number of soldiers in support of the vaccination campaign will be increased by more than 4,000 to over 6,000.
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Joe Biden in the White House
Photo: MANDEL NGAN / AFP
Biden had promised that 100 million doses of vaccine would be given in the first 100 days of his tenure.
After about half of this time, according to the White House, the mark of 81 million cans has already been exceeded since Biden took office.
330 million people live in the United States.
According to the CDC health authority, almost one in four adults has now received at least one dose of vaccine.
Just under 13 percent of adults and more than 30 percent of those who are 65 years of age or older are fully vaccinated.
The Biden government recently announced that the US would order an additional 100 million vaccine doses from the manufacturer Johnson & Johnson.
Novavax vaccine 96 percent effective and nearing approval
1:55
a.m
.:
The US pharmaceutical company Novavax announces that its vaccine is 96 percent effective against the original coronavirus and 86 percent against the British variant.
According to the company, the figures were collected within a study that Novavax was carrying out in the UK.
This means that the company has come one step closer to the approval of the vaccine.
The vaccine could be approved for use in the US as early as May if US authorities consider the data from the UK to be sufficient, the company said.
Lauterbach: Corona vaccinations only from May on a large scale via general practitioners
1:15 a.m.:
SPD health expert Karl Lauterbach expects that the corona vaccinations in the doctor's offices will only start slowly from mid-April.
"But it will take until May before it can run in full in all countries," he told the newspapers of the Funke media group.
"Only then will we have enough vaccine." Lauterbach also defended the later involvement of general practitioners in the corona vaccination campaign.
“If we had already involved the resident doctors, it would have led to disappointment.
If a doctor can only vaccinate a few people a day, but 1000 are waiting for him, that will only cause trouble. "
The medical officers in Germany, on the other hand, criticize a lack of flexibility in the expansion of vaccinations.
"In Germany we always want to do everything very neatly and thoroughly," said the chairwoman of the Federal Association of Doctors in the Public Health Service, Ute Teichert.
You can now see that with the vaccinations: Prioritizing, inviting, registering and documenting would take far too much time and energy.
"When it comes to vaccination, thoroughness and perfectionism stand in the way at the moment," said Teichert.
"We have to find uncomplicated solutions." Doctors in private practice and company doctors would have to be involved quickly.
Romania pauses use of batch of AstraZeneca vaccine
0.35 a.m.:
After Denmark and Norway, Romania is now also
suspending
the use of a batch of the vaccine from the Swedish-British group AstraZeneca.
According to Romanian authorities, the stop in use is seen as an extreme precautionary measure: "The decision to quarantine the batch in question was made solely on the basis of the event reported in Italy." Other doses from the company would continue to be used.
The suspension is expected to continue until the European Medicines Agency has completed an investigation into the case.
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