Merkel orders Germany into hard lockdown as Covid infections swell

Bloomberg

Germany will enter a hard lockdown from Wednesday, with non-essential stores shuttered, employers urged to close workplaces and school children encouraged to remain at home.
The tighter restrictions — including a ban on gatherings over the New Year — will last until at least January 10 as a looser shutdown failed to halt a surge in daily coronavirus infections and deaths. Chancellor Angela Merkel agreed the measures with the heads of Germany’s 16 states in talks on Sunday and warned of rising pressure on the nation’s health system.
“There is an urgent need for action,” Merkel said. “We have seen rising infections and exponential growth in recent days and that means that we have to grieve many dead.”
After comfortably handling the initial wave of the pandemic, the country is lagging behind many of its neighbors, and officials came under increasing pressure to act days before Christmas. Infections and fatalities rose by record amounts, and almost 22,000 have died from the disease, out of a total of 1.3 million cases.
Germany’s stumbles in dealing with the pandemic are linked to its complex and at times dysfunctional federal system, Merkel’s pursuit of open borders and political power plays ahead of next year’s national election. It puts Europe’s largest economy at risk of another blow to consumer and business confidence after the spring lockdown triggered a collapse in activity.