Austrians protest massively against compulsory coronavirus vaccination | News from Germany about Europe | Dw

In Austria, about forty thousand people took to the streets on Saturday, November 27 to protest the mandatory coronavirus vaccination, which is due to begin in the country in February 2022.

The largest protest action took place in Graz, the country’s second largest city. Up to 30,000 people took part in a demonstration against coronavirus restrictions, police said. Some protesters shouted the slogan “Peace, freedom, no dictatorship” into loudspeakers.

Protest actions took place that day in Innsbruck, St. Pölten and Klagenfurt. Despite the peaceful nature of these protests, many of the participants were reported to the police because they came to the event without masks.

Measures to tackle the pandemic in Austria

The government in Vienna intends to introduce universal compulsory vaccination against SARS-CoV-2 infection from February 2022. Specific details of this bill are due in mid-December.

Since November 15, a lockdown has been introduced in Austria, which applies only to residents of the country who have not been vaccinated against coronavirus. Already on November 19, however, Chancellor Alexander Schallenberg announced the decision to expand this lockdown from November 22 to nationwide. Against this background, on November 20, massive protests against government measures to combat the pandemic took place in Vienna.

Omicron coronavirus variant in Austria

Meanwhile, on the evening of November 27, it became known about suspicions of the first case of infection in the country with a mutation of the omicron coronavirus, which is now rapidly spreading in South Africa. The authorities of the federal state of Tyrol reported that a patient was identified there, most likely infected with this particular variant of the coronavirus.

He received a positive PCR test for COVID-19 shortly after returning from South Africa. The patient is currently, however, showing no symptoms of COVID-19, Reuters notes.

The situation with coronavirus in the world

According to the Worldometer portal, by November 27, 2021, since the beginning of the pandemic, the number of coronavirus infections in the world exceeded 261 million cases, more than 236 million of which ended in the recovery of patients. The number of people who died with a confirmed diagnosis of COVID-19 worldwide during this period was 5,211,820.

In Austria, which has a population of about 10 million people, 1,132,805 patients have been diagnosed with coronavirus since the start of the pandemic. About 970,000 people managed to overcome the infection, 12,349 people died.

See also:

• The fourth wave of the covid pandemic in Germany

  Sad statistics

  In one of the cemeteries in Bonn, a man grieves for his wife. She is one of more than 100 thousand people in Germany who have died due to infection with the coronavirus. In recent days in Germany, the number of deaths from covid began to rise sharply again. If on October 1, 66 people died, then in the fourth week of November the average daily rate was more than 200 deaths.

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  The fourth wave of the covid pandemic in Germany

  One final caveat

  Coffins near the crematorium oven. On the lid of one of them, the funeral agency says “crown” in chalk – as a warning to the staff of the crematorium. As in the past, the victims of the pandemic continue to be elderly people who have not been vaccinated. However, the number of cases when vaccinated people get sick with covid is also growing.

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  The fourth wave of the covid pandemic in Germany

  Older people are more at risk than others

  An employee of a nursing home near Berlin is testing an elderly man for the coronavirus. In the past weeks, there have been many cases of infection among residents of nursing homes, some of whom have died. Therefore, in Germany, the discussion about the compulsory vaccination of the personnel of such institutions does not stop. Italy, France and Greece have already introduced it, in Austria such a measure is planned for the near future.

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  The fourth wave of the covid pandemic in Germany

  Regular tests in kindergartens and schools

  Coronavirus tests in schools and kindergartens have become commonplace for most children. No other population group is tested for covid as often and thoroughly. Despite this, the infection rate among children aged 5 to 14 is three times higher than the average in Germany. Many parents are hoping for early admission to the use of vaccines for children.

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  The fourth wave of the covid pandemic in Germany

  Doctors sound the alarm

  A doctor examines a patient in the intensive care unit of the University Hospital Leipzig. Until now, the workload of German hospitals has not reached the level of last winter, but doctors are sounding the alarm. In Saxony, some clinics are preparing for a triage (distribution of patients into groups based on urgency), as they fear that they will soon be unable to provide all the necessary assistance in full.

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  The fourth wave of the covid pandemic in Germany

  Patients stay in intensive care units for a long time

  Patient in the intensive care unit of the city clinic of Dresden. In Germany, the hospital occupancy rate is used to assess the current situation. It is considered controversial because it reflects the spread of infection with a delay. In addition, many hospital patients are now younger than in the past three waves of the pandemic. They stay in intensive care units longer.

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  The fourth wave of the covid pandemic in Germany

  Public transport control

  In public transport, the 3G rule has been in effect since last week – for traveling on buses and trains, you must present either a vaccination certificate, or a certificate of transferred covid, or a negative test for coronavirus. They must be supervised by bus drivers or train conductors. In addition, wearing a protective mask is still mandatory in transport. For violations – a fine of 150 euros.

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  The fourth wave of the covid pandemic in Germany

  My home is my office

  Those who can work from home are strongly encouraged to do so. Only in June, companies canceled the obligation to provide the maximum number of employees with the opportunity to work remotely. This rule is now returning to reduce the number of people-to-people contacts. Therefore, many Germans are working again at their home desk – or on the couch.

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  The fourth wave of the covid pandemic in Germany

  Christmas gingerbread or lockdown?

  In many cities in Germany, for example in Freiburg, Christmas markets are opened in compliance with a number of rules and with a limited number of visitors. However, due to extremely high infection rates in Bavaria and Saxony, they decided to abandon them this year. In Bavaria, a lockdown is being introduced in communities in which the infection rate has exceeded 1000 cases per 100 thousand population per week.

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  The fourth wave of the covid pandemic in Germany

  Get vaccinated without leaving your car

  The vaccination campaign is stalled, so the German government decided to rely on readily available offers again: mobile vaccination stations or vaccine drive-in, when you can get an injection without leaving your car. In addition, Germans are strongly encouraged to get a booster vaccine so that, as future chancellor Olaf Scholz put it, make themselves “winter-hardy.”

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  The fourth wave of the covid pandemic in Germany

  Booster shots and regular tests

  Booster vaccinations are necessary due to the fact that the number of people who have contracted the coronavirus is constantly growing, although they have been vaccinated. Otherwise, only one thing helps – regular tests! Therefore, the German authorities, a month after the introduction of fees for tests, again decided to make them free for everyone – both vaccinated and unvaccinated.

  Author: Sergey Gushcha, Thomas Lachan

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