“To protect the population from virus mutations – this is why the federal government decided yesterday to declare the Czech Republic, Tyrol and Slovakia as coronavirus areas,” Spahn said at a news conference on Friday.
“This means that there will be a ban on transport – and without exception tests must be done before they enter Germany – and there is an obligation to be quarantined.”
Coronavirus cases have recently fallen in Germany, despite the new, more contagious variants. On Friday, the country recorded 9,860 new infections – a decrease of 3,048 cases compared to the same day last week. Austria and the Czech Republic have not seen a similar decline in cases.
In an effort to limit the spread of the variant, local authorities deployed 1,200 police officers and soldiers. From midnight on Friday, which will last ten days, they will be deployed to Tyrol’s border checkpoints to ensure that anyone trying to leave the province has a negative coronavirus test that is not older than 48 hours, said Tyrolean spokesman Stefan Eder. police, told CNN.
Children, cargo traffic and travelers traveling through Tyrol are exempt from the rule.
Meanwhile, parliament in the Czech Republic on Thursday refused to expand the state of emergency. As a result, many of the country’s coronavirus restrictions will be automatically lifted on Sunday when the current state of emergency expires, despite the fact that the virus continues to spread rapidly across the country.
The Czech Minister of Health, Jan Blatny, warned that any easing of the restrictions at this stage would lead to the health system running the risk of running out. This is already happening in some hospitals in the most western region of Karlovarsky.
The decision was the result of a deep political tussle between the minority government, led by populist Prime Minister Andrej Babiš, and the opposition, who accused Babiš of not doing enough to contain the virus.
The opposition argued, among other things, that the government’s lack of financial support for individuals and businesses affected by the pandemic means that people do not follow the rules and skip quarantines because they cannot afford to lose their income.
When Babiš refused to take their proposals on board, the opposition voted against extending the state of emergency. The country is holding important parliamentary elections later this year.
Nadine Schmidt and Claudia Otto reported from Berlin. Ivana Kottasová reports and writes from London.