Berlin | Germany recorded a record number of new Covid-19 infections on Thursday with 50,196 additional cases in 24 hours, a sign of the violence of the epidemic wave that is hitting the country, according to the Robert Koch health watch institute.
This is the first time that the threshold of 50,000 new daily cases has been crossed since the start of the pandemic while Germany has chained record numbers of infections in recent days. The number of deaths in 24 hours rose to 235 on Thursday.
Outgoing Chancellor Angela Merkel on Wednesday judged the resumption of infections in the country as “dramatic”, particularly notable since October.
“The pandemic is spreading again in a spectacular way,” lamented his spokesperson, calling on the regional authorities, competent in health matters, to take new measures to contain the situation.
Pressure is also increasing on hospital care units.
This outbreak is attributed in particular to the relatively low vaccination rate of the population in Germany, just over 67%.
Several particularly affected states, such as Saxony, Bavaria, and most recently Berlin, have introduced new restrictions targeting unvaccinated people who are the first affected by this rebound in the pandemic.
Thus, as of Monday, Berlin will prohibit unvaccinated people from accessing, in particular, restaurants without a terrace, bars, sports halls and hairdressing salons.
A negative test will no longer allow access to these public places if users are not vaccinated or cannot prove that they are cured of the disease.
In total, nearly 4.9 million people have been infected with Covid-19 in Germany since the start of the pandemic.