Germany: RKI head describes COVID situation as "like a tanker headed towards a harbour wall"

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Health Minister Spahn and Robert Koch Institute head Lothar Wieler held a press conference in Berlin on Friday on the latest developments in the coronavirus pandemic.

“It is like a tanker headed towards a harbour wall,” said Wieler as a blunt analogy for the situation. “The tanker is moving at first - if we immediately counter-steer with all our strength, then it will continue to move for a while and may still ram the harbour wall sideways, but hopefully it will not tear it down head-on. We can and must all take countermeasures now.”

The officials recommended vaccinations as well as contact restrictions and corresponding governmental decisions on measures to contain the virus.

“Concentrating on vaccination is not enough. I can see how in many places new resolutions and agreements on vaccination are being made again and again, and they are important, but they are not what breaks the momentum in the situation we are in now. Instead, these are contact-reducing measures taken by each individual in everyday life and corresponding measures taken by the state,” said Spahn.

A scale of possible measures to take based on the number of local hospitalisations was outlined by the government on Thursday and approved by the Bundesrat on Friday. They range from 2G rules, where businesses only admit vaccinated and recovered individuals, to more extensive restrictions on public activities.

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SOT, Lothar Wieler, Robert Koch Institute President (German): “It is like a tanker headed towards a harbour wall. The tanker is moving at first - if we immediately counter-steer with all our strength, then it will continue to move for a while and may still ram the harbour wall sideways, but hopefully it will not tear it down head-on. We can and must all take countermeasures now. Vaccinations and the third vaccination are of course enormously important. Vaccinated people are much less likely to get symptomatic COVID-19 and they are much less likely to need hospitalisation.”

SOT, Jens Spahn, German Health Minister (German): “In the last four weeks alone, the incidence has quintupled, within the last four weeks, the incidence of infection has quintupled with record incidences also in the last few days, and of course, as a result, we are seeing sadly high figures again in the intensive care units in the hospitals in terms of deaths.”

SOT, Lothar Wieler, Robert Koch Institute President (German): “We have often said in advance that we assume that there will be further boosting in the future, but we do not know what the time periods are. If the first people were vaccinated last year in November, then of course we cannot say when their immunity will drop to such an extent that they will have to be boosted again.

SOT, Jens Spahn, German Health Minister (German): “Concentrating on vaccination is not enough. I can see how in many places new resolutions and agreements on vaccination are being made again and again, and they are important, but they are not what breaks the momentum in the situation we are in now. Instead, these are contact-reducing measures taken by each individual in everyday life and corresponding measures taken by the state.”

SOT, Lothar Wieler, Robert Koch Institute President (German): “Even if very few children become seriously ill, I still have the claim that I do not want children in our country to fall seriously ill, even if very few children have died so far, I do not want a single child to die from an infection that we could have prevented.”

#Germany #Berlin #RKI #COVID19 #coronavirus

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