Austria has imposed a set of new restrictions in an attempt to limit the coronavirus rising infections across the country.
From Monday, unvaccinated people cannot enter restaurants, cafes and hairdressers and will not be able to attend large public events.
The new measures aimed to convince a significant number of people in Austria to get vaccinated.
The infection rate had risen to 599.6 cases per 100,000 inhabitants, up from 365.9 cases per 100,000 seven days before.
“It is simply our responsibility to protect the people in our country,” Chancellor Alexander Schallenberg said. The case numbers and increasingly overwhelmed hospital intensive care units (ICUs).
The World Heath Organisation (WHO) warned that Europe could see ‘another half million Covid-19 deaths’ by February.
Covid-19 cases is of “grave concern” and the region could see half a million deaths by next year, WHO said.
With 78 million cases in the WHO’s European region—which spans 53 countries and territories and includes several nations in Central Asia—the cumulative toll now exceeded that of South East Asia, the Eastern Mediterranean region, the Western Pacific, and Africa combined, the organisation said.
“We are, once again, at the epicentre,” WHO Europe director Hans Kluge told a press conference.
Kluge blamed the soaring caseload on “insufficient vaccination coverage” and “the relaxation of public health and social measures”.
The WHO has earlier warned that a new coronavirus “variant of interest” named Mu, also known by its scientific name as B.1.621.
