Hanover (dpa) – Germany is facing a ‘massive’ fifth wave of the coronavirus pandemic driven by the Omicron variant that will put its health services under severe pressure, the country’s new health minister predicted on Friday.
Germany has seen a weeks-long trend of declining infection rates from a fourth wave of the pandemic. The country’s disease control body, the Robert Koch Institute (RKI), reported another decline in the seven-day incidence rate on Friday to 331.8 per 100,000 inhabitants, compared to 413.7 a week ago.
However, Health Minister Karl Lauterbach warned there was worse to come. «I’m assuming a massive fifth wave,» he said while on a visit to the northern city of Hanover.
«We have to assume that the Omicron wave that we are now confronting, which in my view we cannot prevent, will pose a massive challenge to our hospitals, our intensive care units and for society as a whole.»
That challenge could be greater than any seen to date, he said, pointing to Britain’s experience with the Omicron wave.
Even if the symptoms of the disease turned out to be milder, this would not make a difference, he said. While the number of deaths could be kept down for two to three weeks, the rise in infections would negate this.
Looking ahead to the Christmas period, when German families traditionally gather, Lauterbach appealed to travellers to have themselves tested, preferably more than once.
Lauterbach called on doctors and vaccination centres to make use of available stocks of the Moderna vaccine amid reports of shortages.
The health minister, who is a doctor himself, administered shots to children at a vaccination centre set up at Hanover’s zoo.
In the face of some opposition to vaccinating children, who are not in general at high risk from the virus, Lauterbach said he was convinced that «children who want to be vaccinated, with the approval of their parents, are doing themselves and society a favour.»
He was speaking as a campaign to administer third vaccinations – or boosters – to the wider population was in full swing, with a total of 1.24 million vaccinations administered on Thursday, after as many as 1.557 million on Wednesday.
Despite the campaign, the percentage of the total population that has been fully vaccinated stands at just 70.1 per cent, having crept up only slowly over recent weeks.
Boosters have now been administered to 29 per cent of the population.
Bavaria’s health minister, Klaus Holetschek, called on Friday for restrictions to be imposed on travellers entering from Britain.
«I’m watching developments in Britain with great concern. The Omicron variant is spreading there rapidly, and that means we have to act purposefully and quickly,» Holetschek told dpa in Munich.
The German government has classified France, Denmark, Norway, Lebanon and Andorra as high-risk areas from Sunday due to high coronavirus infection figures there.
The change in classification means anyone entering from these countries who has not been fully vaccinated or has not recovered must be quarantined for 10 days. They can be exempted from this at the earliest five days after entry with a negative test.
This means that in future, all of Germany’s neighbouring countries except Luxembourg will be classified as high-risk areas.
Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Albania, Northern Macedonia and Moldova have been removed from the risk list.
Meanwhile a legal row raged on Friday after a court in one of Germany’s federal states, which have power over health decisions under the country’s devolved system of government, overturned a requirement that shoppers show proof of vaccination or recovery from Covid-19 to access retail outlets.
The newly installed centre-left government has explicitly recommended banning the unvaccinated from large parts of the retail sector.
Reacting to the ruling, Health Minister Lauterbach said it made neither epidemiological nor health policy sense to overturn such rules now.
This is especially true because of the upcoming wave with the new virus variant Omicron, he added.
By dpa correspondents
