Covid-19: first containment step in Germany

Many stores and small shops reopen on Monday in Germany, the first step in a long deconfinement operation. On the other side of the Rhine, where the coronavirus epidemic is "under control", schools and high schools will not reopen until May 4.

Life will gradually resume its course in Germany. Food stores, bookstores and car dealers will once again be able to welcome their customers. This measure initially concerns stores with an area of ​​less than 800 square meters.

It is the first step in the deconfinement strategy devised by Angela Merkel and, federalism obliges, the leaders of the sixteen German Länder. The pandemic caused by the Covid-19 is "under control" after a month of restrictions in social life, the government welcomed on Friday 17 April.

The Chancellor, whose management of the crisis is welcomed by the Germans, intends to restart an economy that entered into recession in March, a critical situation which should continue for several months.

"Stage success"

With more than 135,000 officially registered cases and around 4,000 deaths, the pandemic is "under control and manageable" in Germany, in the words of Health Minister Jens Spahn. For the first time, the highly monitored infection rate, which measures the number of people on average infected by each Covid-19 patient, fell to less than 1 on Friday and was limited to 0.7, according to the institute Robert Koch, the federal authority responsible for epidemiological monitoring.

This "milestone success" is nevertheless "fragile", warned Angela Merkel, who had placed herself two weeks in solitary confinement at her Berlin home after having been in contact with a doctor who tested positive for Covid -19.

"We will not be able to live our old life for a long time. Distance and protection will remain the rule and the measure of our daily life", warns Armin Laschet, leader of one of the most affected Länder, North Rhine-Westphalia -Westphalie, and candidate for the presidency of the conservative CDU party.

Germany thus intends to very gradually lift the social restrictions put in place over the past month.