German Chancellor Angela Merkel is wearing a protective mask when she leaves after speaking to the media for her annual summer press conference during the coronavirus pandemic on August 28, 2020 in Berlin, Germany.
Anadolu Agency | Anadolu Agency | Getty Images
Chancellor Angela Merkel will announce that Germany will extend its closure until March 14 amid concerns over new coronavirus strains.
A draft of the document outlining plans between Merkel and state officials to keep the closure and urging citizens to maintain the rules of social distancing, but to lift some restrictions in the coming weeks, emerged early on Tuesday.
The reopening of schools is a priority for the German leadership, although the country’s federal system means that individual states are expected to be able to decide how to do so. The reopening of shops and hotels could begin next month in areas where the infection rate is also low. Restrictions were due to end on February 14th.
There are concerns in Germany about the spread of more contagious variants of the virus, in particular the mutation first discovered in the UK last autumn. However, Germany’s daily number of new infections has been declining amid a continuing blockade of public life across the country.
The public health agency, the Robert Koch Institute, reported 8,072 new cases of coronavirus and 813 deaths on Wednesday, bringing the total number of infections to date to about 2.3 million and the death toll. and 62,969.
Earlier Wednesday, a German lawmaker reported that the situation was “very fragile.”
The slow deployment of the EU
The slow deployment of coronavirus vaccines in Germany, as well as in the rest of the EU, is a problem for the German government, which is a key pillar of the bloc. The EU has been slower than the UK and US to order vaccines from major drug manufacturers and has faced a shortage of supply.
The longer it takes to implement vaccination, the more economic damage from blockages is expected to occur. The German economy contracted by 5% in 2020, according to full-year GDP (gross domestic product) data released in January.
Ludovic Subran, chief economist at Allianz, told CNBC on Wednesday that the slow deployment of vaccination could really damage the EU’s 2021 growth prospects.
“I get a little nervous and we’re only in February that we’re missing the boat here, that vaccination is the best investment there is and that we should put all our strength (effort) into it,” he said. CNBC’s “Street Signs Europe.”
“Our forecasts show that Europe will only return to pre-crisis (growth) levels in 2022, and then we saw the chaos of vaccination and started thinking, ‘Okay, we’re really jeopardizing the recovery here.’ .the problem is here we vaccinate four times slower than the UK and the US, “he said, adding:” This is really a big problem, because this will break the 2021 GDP recovery in Europe. “
—CNBC’s Annette Weisbach contributed to this article.