International COVID-19 Megathread

[Mike88]

Portugal update:

As cases in Lisbon continue to grow, the government has decided to not put the city in lockdown but to speed up vaccinations and persue massive testing of the population.

To be honest, this decision is quite infuriating: when small cities across the country are at 120 cases per 100,000 inhabitants, as Lisbon is right now, a lockdown is implemented. But, because it's the capital, everything is different, not to mention that speeding up the vaccination program in Lisbon, probably means that vaccines for other regions of the country will be diverted to Lisbon.

I hope the government expands this to the rest of the country, otherwise it will be just shameful.

[Mike88]

Portugal update:

As cases in Lisbon continue to grow, the government has decided to not put the city in lockdown but to speed up vaccinations and persue massive testing of the population.

To be honest, this decision is quite infuriating: when small cities across the country are at 120 cases per 100,000 inhabitants, as Lisbon is right now, a lockdown is implemented. But, because it's the capital, everything is different, not to mention that speeding up the vaccination program in Lisbon, probably means that vaccines for other regions of the country will be diverted to Lisbon.

I hope the government expands this to the rest of the country, otherwise it will be just shameful.

As usual, the vaccine task force had to correct the words of the Health secretary and confirm that the speeding up of vaccination will be for the whole country, not just the Lisbon area. Therefore, during June people above 30 years old will start being vaccinated.

https://twitter.com/Publico/status/1397294563287572486

Coronavirus: Vaccination of those over 40 and 30 will start at the same time across the country.

[President Johnson]

Reports of an attempted disinformation campaign on Biontech/Pfizer vaccine surfaced these days. Apparently, influencers on social media were offered payments for spreading disinformation about this vaccine, especially in France. Some links point to Russia.

https://twitter.com/Dobrindt1/status/1397589773326462977

[It’s so Joever]

Reports of an attempted disinformation campaign on Biontech/Pfizer vaccine surfaced these days. Apparently, influencers on social media were offered payments for spreading disinformation about this vaccine, especially in France. Some links point to Russia.

https://twitter.com/Dobrindt1/status/1397589773326462977

If this were China, all of Atlas would be calling for Xi’s head.
It’s a shame how standards are applied differently to Putin’s regime.

[President Johnson]

Positive trend continues.

https://twitter.com/dwnews/status/1397963017371930629

[President Johnson]

Good news from the UK:

https://twitter.com/dwnews/status/1399795631980376064

[Mike88]

And the UK has removed Portugal from their "green" travel list. The irony of all of this is amazing, after last weekend's events in Porto city on the Champions League final.

[Mike88]

And the UK has removed Portugal from their "green" travel list. The irony of all of this is amazing, after last weekend's events in Porto city on the Champions League final.

Now it's also Spain who is demanding that citizens that cross the Portugal-Spain border have to have a negative or a vaccine certificate. Spain also labels Portugal an "area of high risk". The government is freaking out, threatening Spain and demanding that the Spanish Health Authorities correct immediately this decision.

https://twitter.com/dntwit/status/1401920021895413761

Spain imposes covid-19 tests on anyone crossing the border with Portugal

[Mike88]

And the UK has removed Portugal from their "green" travel list. The irony of all of this is amazing, after last weekend's events in Porto city on the Champions League final.

Now it's also Spain who is demanding that citizens that cross the Portugal-Spain border have to have a negative or a vaccine certificate. Spain also labels Portugal an "area of high risk". The government is freaking out, threatening Spain and demanding that the Spanish Health Authorities correct immediately this decision.

Spain is now retracting their measures in the border, saying "it was a mistake" and will tomorrow redraft the document about the Portugal-Spain border measures. The Spanish government has also apologized to Portugal.

This whole situation is just... out of this world.

[President Johnson]

Great news:

https://twitter.com/CNNPolitics/status/1402699538578747396

[It’s so Joever]

I’m very worried about Southern Africa.
Both Zambia and Namibia are seeing sudden spikes, and they obviously both have low vaccination rates.
Hopefully it won’t be as bad as it was in India.

[Clarko95 📚💰📈]

We were told at work that we would be vaccinated in June as a "critical infrastructure" company. Today we found out that because the vaccine deliveries have been so much lower than expected, vaccinations through the corporate doctors will be delayed into July.

Just total f*** up here in Germany. Complete incompetence at all levels. Should have flown back to the U.S. in April to get my shot since no one on this side of the Atlantic can do anything properly.

[Geoffrey Howe]

We were told at work that we would be vaccinated in June as a "critical infrastructure" company. Today we found out that because the vaccine deliveries have been so much lower than expected, vaccinations through the corporate doctors will be delayed into July.

Just total f*** up here in Germany. Complete incompetence at all levels. Should have flown back to the U.S. in April to get my shot since no one on this side of the Atlantic can do anything properly.

We can...

[CumbrianLefty]

Though it is looking ever more likely that our "Freedom Day" on June 21st is going to be put back by at least a few weeks, partly because we were so dilatory in restricting travel to and from India.

[Mike88]

Update on Portugal:

Cases are growing in Portugal and for the first time in 4 months, the number of new daily cases surpassed the 1,000 mark: 1,350 new cases and 6 new deaths. The main area of new infections is the Lisbon area and especially Lisbon city. Around 70% of all cases are from that area.

In terms of vaccines, more than 7,000,000 jabs gave already been given, in which 45% of the population has one dose and 23.81% is already fully vaccinated. Next week, people between 30 and 39 years old will start receiving vaccines.

[Mike88]

The government just announced that circulation to and from the Lisbon Metropolitan Area is forbidden during the weekend. As of today, 1,233 new cases were reported, 65% of those in the Lisbon metro area. The Delta variant is now dominant in Lisbon.

[𝕭𝖆𝖕𝖙𝖎𝖘𝖙𝖆 𝕸𝖎𝖓𝖔𝖑𝖆]

An update on Italy which I had not made in, I believe, quite a long time:

New cases and new deaths per day have just kept falling and falling, and those statistics have reached the lowest level since last summer. By now, even if the colour-coded areas still exist, the majority of the country is in "white zone", which amounts to barely any restriction aside from having to wear a mask for most things in daily life. Almost half of the population has received at least one dose of vaccine and more than a quarter has received a complete vaccination; the rate of new jabs seems to have stopped accelerating after reaching about 550 thousand a day, but it is still fairly strong.

[MATTROSE94]

An update on Italy which I had not made in, I believe, quite a long time:

New cases and new deaths per day have just kept falling and falling, and those statistics have reached the lowest level since last summer. By now, even if the colour-coded areas still exist, the majority of the country is in "white zone", which amounts to barely any restriction aside from having to wear a mask for most things in daily life. Almost half of the population has received at least one dose of vaccine and more than a quarter has received a complete vaccination; the rate of new jabs seems to have stopped accelerating after reaching about 550 thousand a day, but it is still fairly strong.

That's pretty good news out of Italy. I remember that COVID was surging there back in February of March. I guess Mario Draghi is doing a great job as Prime Minister.

[President Johnson]

Some not so great news from the vaccine front: German CureVac, based in Tübingen (just few miles from where I live), was one of the earliest Biotech companies to do coronavirus vaccine research. Back in the spring and summer 2020 it seemed so promising that the EU preordered millions of doses and the German federal government invested millions of Euros. Now a study revealed their vaccine candidate is not that effective and unlikely to be approved by the EMA. CureVac wants to continue research, but they're out for the foreseeable future.

https://twitter.com/dwnews/status/1405800197670637570

[Silent Hunter]

Sadly we need to update the title; it's now over 4 million global deaths.

[It’s so Joever]

Now in all seriousness, the rapid rise of the Delta variant should be of concern for even some highly vaccinated countries. Like Alpha, this variant does have a lot more capacity to spread. Luckily, Delta does not appear to be vaccine resistant (as opposed to Beta) to a high degree. Get your shots even if you are young, this variant has different symptoms and there is anecdotal evidence that it does hurt unvaccinated young people harder than previous Covid. Additionally, every unvaccinated person is another place for a new mutation. Don’t be patient zero, get your shot.

[Mike88]

This is creating quite a stir in Portugal:

https://twitter.com/POLITICOEurope/status/1407403291718324243

German Chancellor Angela Merkel warned Tuesday that the EU is "backfiring" in its goal to set consistent travel rules as countries take varying approaches to the surge of a new COVID variant in Britain.

Her critical remarks singled out Portugal, which has allowed the entry of British tourists despite the highly infectious Delta virus variant actively circulating in the U.K.

“What I regret is that we have not yet been able to achieve a uniform behavior among the member states in terms of travel restrictions. That is backfiring," Merkel said at a joint press conference in Berlin with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.

"We now have a situation in Portugal that could perhaps have been avoided, and that's why we have to work even harder on this," Merkel added. "We've made pretty good progress in recent months, but we're not yet where I would like the European Union to be.”

Coronavirus infections in Portugal have spiked in recent weeks from less than 500 reported cases a day in May to over 1,000 daily cases recently. According to local authorities, the Delta variant —  first detected in India — accounts for more than 60 percent of infections in the Lisbon and Tagus Valley region. The government on Friday imposed a weekend travel ban around the capital to stop its spread.

The rise of infections comes about one month after Portugal, which currently holds the rotating Presidency of the Council of the EU, opened up to British tourists, even though other countries like Germany and France imposed a strict travel ban on the U.K. because of the rapidly spreading Delta variant. Spain equally allowed the entry of British tourists.
(...)

[urutzizu]

This is creating quite a stir in Portugal:

She isn't wrong, because the EU agreed to have a ban on non-essential travel on third countries with exception of those with good epidemiological situations (Israel, Japan, South Korea and now US but explicitly not UK). Many MS went against that, but Portugal was the only unfortunate enough to be put on the UK quarantine-free list too.

But it is also stupid because the situation isn't exactly that much better in Germany. Delta varient is already at 25% of new infections in places like Munich, because Germany's restrictions against travel from those countries (UK and India) are a joke too. While there is a ban on non-citizens except with residence in Germany, if you meet the criteria all you need is a test before boarding (the antigen self-test crap will do) and then you go home (public transport is fine) where you are supposed to self-isolate for 14 days. Especially because most people returning from places like India are students, and you can self-isolate really well in student accommodation.

The cost-benefit ratio if all MS could just agree to a universal hotel-isolation system for anyone travelling into (mainland) Europe, and then being able to drop all the restrictions to internal European travel plus having to worry much less about the variants, but it doesn't work if only some states do it.

[Silent Hunter]

Universal hotel isolation would cost a lot, wouldn't it? And you would still get the potential for leaks.

[Mike88]

This is creating quite a stir in Portugal:

She isn't wrong, because the EU agreed to have a ban on non-essential travel on third countries with exception of those with good epidemiological situations (Israel, Japan, South Korea and now US but explicitly not UK). Many MS went against that, but Portugal was the only unfortunate enough to be put on the UK quarantine-free list too.

But it is also stupid because the situation isn't exactly that much better in Germany. Delta varient is already at 25% of new infections in places like Munich, because Germany's restrictions against travel from those countries (UK and India) are a joke too. While there is a ban on non-citizens except with residence in Germany, if you meet the criteria all you need is a test before boarding (the antigen self-test crap will do) and then you go home (public transport is fine) where you are supposed to self-isolate for 14 days. Especially because most people returning from places like India are students, and you can self-isolate really well in student accommodation.

The cost-benefit ratio if all MS could just agree to a universal hotel-isolation system for anyone travelling into (mainland) Europe, and then being able to drop all the restrictions to internal European travel plus having to worry much less about the variants, but it doesn't work if only some states do it.

She's on mark regarding her criticisms towards Portugal. The events during May, the mass opening of UK tourists, the Sporting celebrations, the Champions final, all were stupid, stupid mistakes and we are now dealing with the consequences, and what is worse is that the government is, frankly, lost in what to do.

You are right, there should be a basic system for what should countries do in these situations. If countries follow them or not, that's their choice, but right now I agree that there should be a simple guide line on what to do. However, I'm not sure if EU countries would agree on that, just look at the Euro 2020 organization, some stadiums are full, some are half full, some countries have mask mandates, others are lifting them up. Like you said, a common system would be usefull, but I have my doubts it would be agreed on.