CZECH BAR STAFF TAKES DRINKING AND DRIVING TO ANOTHER LEVEL

PRAGUE— A Czech cafe has turned its bar area into a model electric car track for bartenders and staff to pass the time while the country’s pubs and restaurants are shuttered to the public to curb a rising tide of coronavirus infections.

Staff at Mlynska cafe—popular with Prague’s artist community—said they decided to set up the track when one of them discovered they had an old set stored away at home.

While restaurants and pubs are closed for dining and drinking inside, staff remain on standby for take away orders.

“It was a sudden idea,” said bar manager Jan Sramek. “We said if we can’t use the space as we used to ... we’d have the kind of fun here we can’t have when we have guests.”

The central European country, which has the continent’s fastest per capita rise in COVID-19 infections and deaths from the disease, earlier this week closed restaurants, bars and clubs and shifted schools to distance learning.

In a sad parallel, the Czech Republic has one of Europe’s fastest rising tallies of COVID-19 cases, zooming to 11,105 on Friday, its largest single-day increase so far of the pandemic, Health Ministry data showed on Saturday.

The total number of cases the country has detected since March has risen to 160,112, double the number seen on Oct. 2 and more than six times the amount overall before September.

In the two weeks to Friday, the Czech Republic recorded more than 74,000 cases, 10,000 more than Italy which has almost six times the population, according to the European Center for Disease Prevention and Control.

Czech hospitals are racing to free up capacity with patient numbers tripling this month to 3,120, more than seven times the peak seen in the first wave of the disease.

The country of 10.7 million has reported 333 deaths in the past seven days to bring its total to 1,283.

Health officials have warned that the coming weeks will be difficult but said on Friday the system was not facing collapse. They estimate up to 5,000 patients will be in hospital by the end of the month, with a fifth of in intensive care.

The government is securing treatment space outside of hospitals, including building a makeshift medical facility at a fairground in Prague.

It has also agreed with larger neighbor Germany, which has seen 10 times fewer cases per capita over the past two weeks than the Czech Republic, to possibly send some Czech patients to its hospitals.

To fight the spread of the coronavirus, the government has closed bars and restaurants, sport and fitness centres, theaters and cinemas, and shifted schools to distance learning.

— REUTERS SHORT CIRCUIT A bartender (right) prepares a drink on Oct. 16 after he and colleagues set up a miniature race track at the Mlynska cafe. The government ordered the bar—along with others in the Czech Republic—to suspend operations to slow the spread of the coronavirus.

— REUTERS WORK TIME, PLAYTIME Bartenders prepare to race on the electric track for model cars while waiting for takeout orders at Mlynska cafe, which on regular days is popular with Prague’s artist community. Coronavirus restrictions are currently keeping customers away.

— REUTERS SPEEDING ON A SLOWDAY A model race car zips across an electric-powered track as a bartender fixes a drink in the background for a takeout order. A two-week suspension order on the operation of bars has left Czech bartenders looking for things to do to kill time.

— REUTERS FUN WITHOUT GUESTS Car racing keeps bartenders busy and entertained during the COVID-19 shutdown.