germany's top infectious disease
institute says the number of coveted 19
related deaths reported of the last day
rose to a record 952.
that grim news comes just as the country
enters a harder
national lockdown with schools and
non-essential businesses to remain
closed through january 10th
the new restrictions coming into effect
sent some last-minute shoppers
scrambling to buy presents
in time for the holidays
there's always a surge of people at
christmas time hunting for last-minute
gifts
but this year the crush has come earlier
than usual in germany
shoppers rushed to make last minute
purchases ahead of the country's tough
lockdown
people seem pretty stressed about the
whole thing you can feel it but we're
finished
we got it done
for health reasons all i can say is that
it's the right thing to do
we can't wait until it all falls to
pieces
but while some may not find what they're
looking for a welcome christmas present
may be coming soon germany is waiting
for the first coronavirus vaccines to be
approved
the problem is so far not even the
health minister knows when that will
happen
national authorities are supporting the
european authorities to the best of
their ability
the goal is to secure approval before
christmas
germans have watched patiently as a
vaccine invented in the country
has been rolled out already in the uk
and the u.s
mass immunization centers are currently
being equipped
millions of doses of vaccine are on
order
those with heightened risk of infection
will be invited first
the elderly as well as front-line
medical workers
establishing priority is key in
distributing the vaccine
many people want it as quickly as
possible but there isn't enough
at least in the beginning so that's why
we need
clear and transparent priorities the
vaccine is being kept under key and lock
and it's very highly protected
the vaccine is coming to germany but
unlike with father christmas himself
nobody can yet be sure when to expect it
okay let's break down now what has
changed in germany with this new
stricter lockdown
starting today all non-essential shops
are closed
supermarkets pharmacies as well as banks
are allowed to remain open
schools are shut until the 10th of
january and employers are being
encouraged to allow their staff to work
from home as far as possible
chancellor angela merkel also made an
appeal for people to limit their social
contacts during the holidays the number
of people allowed to meet indoors will
remain restricted
to five not including children under 14.
and in anticipation of new year's
celebrations
sales of fireworks have also been banned
and let's bring in our political
correspondent nina haza with the latest
on this high nina
can some of these new measures really be
enforced
well it is quite easy to enforce
measures like
the wearing of masks the closure of
schools um
and the closure of shops um but it is a
bit trickier of course when it comes to
controlling just how many people are
gathering in a private flat
because of course the privacy in
people's homes is regarded extremely
highly here in germany and authorities
do need to have
good reasons to intervene but they can
do so there are um exceptions to that
rule that you can do
basically whatever you want in your home
and those
exceptions also apply to the current
corona measures so
it is the situation that neighbors could
theoretically report their neighbors to
the police and the police could
come knocking on people's doors to check
whether they see
that the corona measures are not adhered
to in
people's private homes and let me just
add that the police have been called on
numerous occasions throughout the
pandemic and they have broken
private parties illegal parties that
were held
against those rules but it of course it
is up to the individual police people to
then
decide whether those measures of
imposing fines which they could
potentially also do
would be appropriate or not and of
course it's not a picture that anybody
wants politicians have said clearly
we don't want the police to sit around a
christmas tree in people's homes
and church leaders also are simply
appealing to the german population to
adhere to the rules
how does the german population see this
these new rules
it's interesting if you look at the
polls from the
latest months there was always half of
germans who always said
the measures are appropriate because
they could see that
measures were necessary to bring down
infection numbers
numbers and then there were always about
30 percent of the german population who
said no the measures are not enough
the numbers are rising too fast and this
is something where i think
people are now beginning to see the
dramatic situation in hospitals we are
beginning to hear of reports
where doctors are having to decide which
patient gets intubated and which one
doesn't simply because
there's a lack of resources and that of
course
is bringing it home to people that the
situation is extremely dangerous and
that a lot more needs to be done
to not only stop exponential growth but
to reduce the number of new infections
so that we can get control over the
situation again so i believe that
germans
are in the majority of cases
okay with the measures our political
correspondent nina has a reporting
thank you so much now we have peter lisa
with us he's a member
of the european parliament and the
health spokesperson for the largest
political group in the parliament
the epp mr lisa good morning thank you
for joining us
i want to start out first of all with
the vaccines because we know that some
countries like the u.s
and britain they are already vaccinating
with the biontech pfizer shot
why is it taking european authorities
longer to approve it
yeah because we are having a more safe
procedure
europe will have the first regular
approval of the vaccine united kingdom
and the us have done emergency
authorization
and that is less safe because of three
reasons
first of all we got more data
biontech delivered data even yesterday
night
and the second is that the liability is
for the producer with a regular
approval like in the european union
and more people are looking at the data
on side effects and
efficacy so i think it's only a few days
longer but it adds
safety to the process and that's
important
but we're talking about the same vaccine
here aren't we so you're saying that it
was less safe for britain and the u.s to
move forward with approval so quickly
are you worried about the safety of this
vaccine
i trust in biontech i know these people
they are serious
but in german we say fatan is good
control is better so trust is good
but to check it is better and the checks
have been more intensive and i know that
many people are concerned because the
vaccine comes so fast
normally normally from the first
scientific project to the approval
it takes years and now we have less than
12 months
so we need to clarify that everything is
in order
and that's why this european approach in
my view
is is better they have worked day and
night
as i said in the night beyond accent
data and the emma
immediately received them and
distributed them
so i think this is important to to do it
fast
but it's also important to do it safe so
is that also what you're worried about
that because this approval process has
generally been very fast that there's
not going to be
enough trust among the public do you
think not enough people are going to
take this vaccine
i'm optimistic that in the end many
people
will be ready to be vaccinated but the
process must be
in order it is not
only an issue of pace it is also
a question of working day and night and
the question of money normally the
development
takes a long time because people
um yeah in industry they invest
carefully because when there is a
failure
in the beginning you lose few money when
you
invest a lot in like biontech did 40 40
000 people in a clinical trial
you lose a lot and that was risk sharing
the european union funded by on tech the
german government funded by on tech
so that if there would have been a
failure which i don't
expect then the risk is not only for the
company so
there are many reasons why it's fast and
if we have a regular
conditional market licensing from the
ema i
trust in the safety and i will really
recommend everybody who is
in order when when we have enough
vaccine
to get vaccinated mr lisa beyond the the
vaccine the head of the world medical
association expects that we will see
tough restrictions
until spring why is that
yeah first of all we don't have enough
vaccine
it's a problem even in the uk
that in the united states the pictures
gives the impression that everything is
fine now it is not
also uk and us will not have enough
vaccine and that's the same with
germany and the members of the european
union
and that's why i think
we need to be prudent but i don't agree
with mr montgomery
that the strict restrictions as we have
it now in germany
need to go until spring we should look
at
ireland as an example ireland has
managed to bring down the affections
in october there were much worse
much higher figures per capita than in
germany and other european countries and
now
they have opened pubs and they have
opened
gyms because they brought down the
figures so if we all adhere to the
measures
we can bring the figures down and
that's what we have to do now in the
coming weeks in germany
all right we'll have to leave it there
peter lisa the health health
spokesperson for the epp in the european
parliament thank you so much
thank you bye let's take a look now some
other developments
in the pandemic the drug regulator in
the united states says
its analysis shows the moderna vaccine
is safe and
94 effective that data means the vaccine
could get emergency approval in days and
could be rolled out
next week south korean officials say
there are only
three intensive care hospital beds left
in the capital seoul
a city with a population nearly 26
million
the country has reported a record surge
in cases in recent days
and scientists from the world health
organization are planning to visit the
chinese city of wuhan where the outbreak
was first reported
they want to find out how the virus
moved from animals to humans
you