■ Germany extended its virus shutdown but allowed easing of restrictions in some areas.
Merkel, governors plan easing of restrictions in some areas
BERLIN— Germany is extending its coronavirus shutdown by three weeks until March 28 but easing some restrictions to allow nonessential stores and other businesses to reopen in areas with relatively low infection rates.
After about nine hours of talks, Chancellor Angela Merkel and the governors of the country’s 16 states agreed Wednesday to measures aimed at balancing concern over the impact of more contagious coronavirus variants with a clamor for a return to a more normal life.
The first moves have been made: Many elementary students returned to school last week. And on Monday, hairdressers opened after a 2½-month break. Current lockdown rules were set to run through Sunday.
On Wednesday, Merkel and the state governors — who in decentralized Germany have the power to impose and lift restrictions — set out a phased plan that allows for some further relaxation of restrictions.
“These should be steps toward opening but at the same time steps that do not set us back,” Merkel told reporters in Berlin. “There are a great many examples in Europe of a dramatic third wave.”
She pledged that “spring 2021 will be different from spring a year ago.”
Regions where infection rates are relatively low, though not as low as previously envisioned, will be able to open nonessential stores, museums and other facilities on a limited basis.
Most stores have been closed nationwide since Dec. 16. Restaurants, bars, sports and leisure facilities have been closed since Nov. 2 and hotels are allowed only to accommodate business travelers.
When they last conferred on
Feb. 10, Merkel and the governors set a target of 35 weekly new cases per 100,000 inhabitants before letting small stores, museums and other businesses reopen. The aim is to enable reliable contact-tracing.
But reaching that target soon appeared unrealistic as cases of the more contagious variant first detected in Britain increased, with overall infections creeping slightly higher. The cases-per-week number, which peaked at nearly 200 per 100,000 inhabitants just before Christmas, has been stalled above 60 in recent days. In other developments:
■ A national panel of vaccine experts in Canada recommended Wednesday that provinces extend the interval between the two doses of a COVID-19 shot to four months to quickly inoculate more people amid a shortage of doses in Canada. A number of provinces said they would do just that.
■ More African countries received the long-awaited first deliveries of COVID-19 vaccines on Wednesday, with Kenya, Rwanda, Senegal and Lesotho benefiting from the global COVAX initiative that aims to ensure doses for the world’s low-and middle-income nations.
■ Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga said Wednesday he is considering extending a coronavirus state of emergency in the Tokyo region for about two weeks because of concerns that infections have not slowed enough and are continuing to strain medical systems in the region.
■ Authorities in Greece said Wednesday that police will target people making false exercise claims to bypass stay-at-home orders as part of tougher new restrictions.