Coronavirus update, Sept. 6, 2021: Sunday increase suggests a rise in Covid spread in the Czech Republic

Vaccination centers in shopping malls where one can be inoculated against Covid without prior registration will keep functioning at least until October, Czech Health Minister Adam Vojtěch told Czech Television. Vojtěch said he was in contact with the operators of the vaccination centers without registration. Along with some shopping malls, they are open at Prague’s main rail station Hlavní nádraží. He presumed it would also be possible to apply the planned third vaccination dose there. Vojtěch said the gradual closure of large-capacity centers in sports and cultural halls was in harmony with the planned strategy. Vaccination will shift to hospitals and general practitioners. From early October, GPs will have access to vaccines from Pfizer, Vojtěch said.

She said there was the COVID totalitarianism in the Czech Republic. It is bad that children must walk along schools corridors in face masks, although they are tested, while some teachers tell the children that being inoculated is responsible, Hyťhová said. Some speakers said Covid-19 did not spread among children. One of the activists of the group Let Us Return Children to Schools said with its epidemic measures, the government had deprived children of careless childhood, education, and joy from friendship.

European Union finance ministers today will take the last necessary step so that the Czech Republic can start drawing money from an extraordinary fund for post-pandemic economic recovery. Representatives of EU governments will discuss the Czech National Recovery Plan, on the basis of which the Czech Republic can receive up to CZK 180 billion in direct subsidies. If the member states approve the plan as expected, the first money could come to the Czech Republic already during September. This year, EU countries began to distribute the first money from the fund with a total volume of over CZK 19 trillion. One of the key requirements to get the money is that states spend at least 37 percent of their money on environmentally friendly projects, and a fifth on digitization.

According to Adam Vojtěch, the requirement to wear a respirator and other measures will be repealed when 75 percent of the Czech Republic is vaccinated. The Czech Republic will be able to repeal restrictive measures including the requirement to wear a respirator in many indoor locations including shops and public transport vehicles when about 75 percent of the population is vaccinated against Covid-19, Health Minister Adam Vojtěch stated in a TV interview. He estimated that the 75 percent threshold could be reached by the end of the autumn. Currently, about 54 percent of the Czech population is vaccinated against Covid-19. See our full story here.

The Czech Vaccinology Society of the Jan Evangelista Purkyně Czech Medical Association has newly directly recommended that pregnant women be inoculated against Covid-19 in its latest report from late August. In June, the Society said this was possible, but it set some conditions for this, such as no vaccination before the 12th week of pregnancy. The experts primarily recommended the Covid vaccination to the women working in the health system, suffering from asthma and diabetes, and those over 35. "The benefit from the vaccination for pregnant women is much higher than the theoretical risk of the vaccination. This is why the Society recommends the vaccination of pregnant women," the report said. See our full story here.

Not only Covid vaccinated people, but also those with a negative coronavirus test and a certificate of the past disease in the previous 180 days will be needed for public events connected with Pope Francis' visit to Slovakia, the Slovak Bishops Conference (KBS) said. The conditions of the participation of the public were somewhat eased after only roughly one-tenth from the presumed 350,000 persons have registered for the expected peak of Pope Francis' visit at the mass in Šaštín, West Slovakia. Pope Francis will visit Slovakia between Sept. 12 and 15.

There were 139 Covid case reported for Sunday, up from 81 a week earlier, according to Health Ministry data. This is the highest Sunday increase in about two months. In a week-on-week comparison, increases in the number of new cases increase for seven days in a row. There were 56 people hospitalized, three more than a day earlier. The number of people in serious condition dropped by one to reach nine. No deaths were reported for the third day in a row, and the toll of September is at one. Just 3,814 vaccinations were made, and of those, 2,452 were final doses. That is the lowest number of vaccinations since the end of February. The reproduction number rose slightly to 1.27, and has been above 1.0 for 12 days. The incidence number of new cases per 100,000 over seven days is at 16, the same as a day earlier. The worst situation is in the Karlovy Vary region, where the incidence number is 32 and the R number is 1.91. In Prague, the incidence number is 27, and the R number is 0.97.