WHO calls Europe shots push too slow

Premier defends French travel ban, shut schools; Easter restraint urged in Germany

LONDON — European nations’ immunization campaigns against covid-19 are “unacceptably slow” and risk prolonging the pandemic, a senior World Health Organization official said Thursday.

Dr. Hans Kluge, WHO’s regional director for Europe, said vaccines “present our best way out of this pandemic,” but noted that to date only 10% of Europe’s population has received one dose and only 4% has gotten two.

“As long as coverage remains low, we need to apply the same public health and social measures as we have in the past, to compensate for delayed schedules,” Kluge said.

Kluge warned European governments against having “a false sense of security” for having started their immunization campaigns.

WHO said new infections are increasing in every age group except those older than 80, in a sign that vaccination efforts are having an impact in slowing outbreaks. But the U.N. health agency said “early action” to stop the virus’ spread must be taken in the absence of high immunization rates.

Also on Thursday,French Prime Minister Jean Castex defended new measures that include closing schools for three weeks and a monthlong domestic travel ban, saying his government has acted “consistently and pragmatically.”

The National Assembly approved the latest measures 348-9 after opposition parties boycotted the vote en masse.

Jean-Luc Melenchon of the leftist La France Insoumise party denounced the vote as a “bad April Fools’.” Dismissing the measures as half-baked, he urged President Emmanuel Macron to increase vaccine supplies and adopt a more effective strategy.

Critics cite arrogance at the highest levels. They say France’s leaders ignored warning signs, and favored political and economic calculations over public health.

“We feel this wave coming very strongly,” said Romain Beal, a blood oxygen specialist at the Amiens-Picardie Hospital. “We had families where we had the mother and her son die at the same time in two different ICU rooms here. It’s unbearable.”

In Germany, Chancellor Angela Merkel asked residents to consider the strain that nurses and doctors are under as they care for a rising number of patients and help them by respecting social distancing and other rules over Easter.

The head of the Robert Koch Institute has warned that the country is seeing a third surge fueled by more contagious variants that have come to dominate the outbreak in Germany.

“There needs to be a quiet Easter festival,” Merkel said in a video address. “I urgently ask you to refrain from all nonurgent travel [and] that we all consistently follow the rules.”

She insisted that the vaccine campaign will pick up this month.

In Canada, the leader of the nation’s most populous province announced a shutdown for four weeks because of a third surge of infections fueled by more contagious variants.

Premier Doug Ford said Ontario is fighting a new pandemic with the variants and that the virus is spreading faster. The measures ban indoor public events and gatherings except for retail and grocery stores. Schools will remain open. Hair salons will be closed, and there will be no indoor or patio dining.

“We’re now fighting a new enemy. The new variants are far more dangerous than before. They spread faster, and they do more harm than the virus we were fighting last year. Young people are ending up in hospital,” Ford said.

Dr. Andrew Morris, a professor of infectious diseases at the University of Toronto and the medical director of the Antimicrobial Stewardship Program at Sinai-University Health Network, called the Ford government “incompetent.”

“It is a tragic and unequivocal failure, fertilized by repeated rejection of scientific evidence,” Morris said.

In Serbia, police took a well-known Serbian doctor and other vocal anti-vaccination activists in for questioning, saying they were jeopardizing the country’s successful inoculation drive.

Serbian state TV said psychiatrist Jovana Stojkovic, a leading figure in the country’s anti-vaccination movement, was taken to a police station in Belgrade to face accusations that she has been spreading “fear and panic” with her social media posts and public appearances.

Information for this article was contributed by Jill Lawless, Angela Charlton, Sylvie Corbet, Maria Cheng, Frank Jordans, Rob Gillies and staff members of The Associated Press.