Merkel warns difficult winter ahead at half-way point of shutdown
BERLIN – German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Saturday (14) warned of a difficult winter to come two weeks into a month-long partial shutdown aimed at dampening coronavirus case numbers.
“The coming winter will make heavy demands of us all,” Merkel said in her weekly podcast. Her comments come at the half-way point of a month-long set of restrictions on public life in Germany aimed at stemming the spread of the virus.
“The virus will continue to dominate our lives for quite some time,” Merkel said, adding this would mean that people could not meet up as easily as in the past.
Her comments come ahead of a meeting planned for Monday (16) with state representatives to assess the effectiveness of the country’s partial shutdown.
Meanwhile, a number of demonstrations against the measures are planned throughout the country. Rallies are planned in Berlin, Frankfurt, Karlsruhe and a number of southern towns and cities.
Germany on Saturday recorded 22,461 new coronavirus infections, the country’s disease control centre said. So far, the country has reported 773,556 cases, and a death toll of 12,378 – an increase of 178 in the past 24 hours.
-dpa