Read news from:
Austria
SHARE
COPY LINK

COVID-19

Covid-19 cases ‘explode’ in Europe: Which countries are under lockdown or curfew?

As Europe sees an "explosion" of Covid-19 cases many countries are reimposing tight restrictions that they had relaxed over the summer. Here's a round-up of what rules are in place in each country.

Published: 5 November 2020 19:52 CET
Updated: 6 November 2020 09:17 CET
Covid-19 cases 'explode' in Europe: Which countries are under lockdown or curfew?
Police in the French Riviera city of Nice check permission forms. Photo: AFP

Europe has become the region with the highest number of registered cases of the new coronavirus,

The continent's 52 countries have a combined total of 11.6 million cases including more than 293,000 deaths, ahead of Latin America and the Caribbean which has reported 11.4 million cases with 407,000 deaths.

Europe has again become the epicentre of the pandemic. On Thursday The World Health Organization in Europe on Thursday said they were seeing an “explosion” of virus cases in the European region and warned mortality rates were also rising.

As a result lockdowns, curfews and tough restrictions are being imposed across Europe as it struggles to cope with the second wave of the coronavirus.

Here are the latest measures being taken:

UNITED KINGDOM: England's second lockdown starts Thursday for a month following neighbouring Wales and Northern Ireland. Schools and universities stay open with cafes and restaurants allowed to offer takeaways. Wales imposed a two-week 'circuit-breaker' lockdown on October 23rd with all non-essential trips out of the home barred. Some secondary schools have also closed.

FRANCE: The country went back into lockdown on October 30th, having earlier imposed curfews on some major cities in an attempt to curb the rapidly rising case numbers.

France's second lockdown is less strict than its spring restrictions and schools remain open along with some types of business. However all 'non essential' shops have had to close and every trip outside the home in France now requires an attestation permission form showing that the person in outside for an essential reason such as school, work or grocery shopping. Trips out for exercise are allowed for one hour per day, within 1km of the home.

Source ECDC

READ ALSO These are the 'essential' reasons you are allowed out of your home in France 

GREECE: Three-week lockdown starts on Saturday, with Greeks needing an authorisation by text message to leave their homes. Primary schools and creches stay open.

IRELAND: The first country in Europe to go back into lockdown on October 22nd. Schools remain open but non-essential trips outside the home are barred.

DENMARK: Does not have a lockdown in the general understanding of the term, but announced significant local restrictions on movement in the North Jutland region on November 5th. The measures are in the form of a request, and ask residents in seven northern municipalities not to leave their home areas. Restaurants, sports and cultural activities will also be closed for the next four weeks.

The decision by the Danish government is in response to a concerning outbreak of a mutated form of coronavirus which occurred in mink and has now been passed back to humans. 

The mutation “could pose a risk that future (coronavirus) vaccines won't work the way they should,” Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen told a press conference, adding: “It is necessary to cull all the minks.”

READ ALSO: How serious is Denmark's mink coronavirus mutation and outbreak?

SPAIN: Most of Spain's region have imposed perimeter confinements to close off the borders and stop people crossing between different regions. Many municpalities are also under perimetral confinements including all towns in Cantabria, the Basque Country and Murcia and all provincial capitals in Aragon and Asturias. Galicia has closed off all its provincial capitals plus 60 smaller municpalities while La Rioja has closed off the cities of Logroño and Arnedo. Andalusia has restrictions around provinces of Seville, Jaen and Granada. 

Madrid has taken the decision to limit movement in and out of the region only over the bank holiday weekends but imposed perimetral confinement of 35 healthcare zones within its territory for at least two weeks while Catalonia has a regional confinement and is limiting people to within their own municpalities at weekends.

LATEST: What are the restrictions in place in each of Spain's regions right now?

GERMANY: Bars, restaurants and leisure facilities have been closed since Monday November 2nd, and are slated to remain shut until the end of the month, with only take-out and deliveries allowed. Overnight stays for tourism purposes are also prohibited.

As opposed to the spring shutdown, Germany’s new oft-dubbed “lockdown light” still allows schools and kitas to remain open.

Up to 10 people from two separate households are also able to meet, and in some states outdoor facilities such as zoos and tennis courts can remain open as long as hygiene and social distancing measures are adhered to.

READ ALSO: Germany enters month-long partial lockdown

PORTUGAL: More than two-thirds of the population urged not to leave home except to go to work, school and do food shopping.

NORWAY:Premier Erna Solberg appealed Thursday for people to “stay home as much as possible” and avoid social contact even though the country has one of the lowest rates of the virus in Europe. 

That represents a reversal of the approach from just a few weeks ago, when a tentative reopening was announced. Solberg said that “we do not have time to wait and see if the measures we introduced the week before last are sufficient. We must act now to avoid a lockdown.”

Several of the new measures impact travel into the country, including for family members visiting Norway-based relatives. Solberg also advised strongly against travelling within Norway.

READ ALSO: Norway announces strict new coronavirus measures: Here are the details to know

SWITZERLAND: Non-essential shops closed in Geneva and its region, with people urged only to leave home when strictly necessary. 

In the majority of Switzerland, bars and restaurants are not allowed to open at night and meeting in large groups is restricted. 

ITALY: Local nighttime curfews go national fon Friday, from 10pm to 6am.

Several Italian regions are also under lockdown from Friday under a new three-tiered system.

MAP: Which zone is each region in under Italy’s new tier system?

BELGIUM: Despite being called a lockdown, people are free to move around  during the day. All non-essential shops closed, with homeworking now the norm.  A curfew ending at 5am has been in force since October 19th.

CZECH REPUBLIC: Shops must close at 8pm and on Sundays with curfew from 9pm. 

AUSTRIA: Curfew from 8pm to 6am since Tuesday, with museums, cinemas, theatres and swimming pools shut. Birthday parties and Christmas markets banned. 

READ: Everything you need to know about Austria's coronavirus shutdown 

People must be in their own homes or the homes of their 'life partners' and can only leave for work or to exercise. Picking up food or shopping is not allowed, but delivery is ok. 

SLOVAKIA, SLOVENIA, CYPRUS, LUXEMBOURG: All under curfew.

KOSOVO: Curfew only for over 65s.

POLAND: Cinemas and most shopping centres closed.

THE NETHERLANDS: Cinemas, museums and other public spaces shut.

SWEDEN: Sweden has so far rolled out local coronavirus rules in 10 out of 21 regions. These vary depending on region, but the most common factors are to limit social contact, avoid indoor venues and avoid public transport. They take the form of strong recommendations which have a legal basis and are not considered optional, but are not coercive and you can generally not be fined for breaking them. Everyone in the country is also urged to follow national recommendations, such as working from home if they can, and avoiding large parties or gatherings.

 

Member comments

Log in here to leave a comment.
Become a Member to leave a comment.

HEALTH

‘Some towns had zero births’: Greenlanders sue Denmark over forced contraception

Henriette Berthelsen was separated from her family at 11 and forced to wear a contraceptive coil, a trauma she buried until she and 142 other Greenlandic women sued the Danish state.

Published: 3 May 2024 11:07 CEST
'Some towns had zero births': Greenlanders sue Denmark over forced contraception

Henriette Berthelsen was separated from her family at 11 and forced to wear a contraceptive coil, a trauma she buried until she and 142 other Greenlandic women sued the Danish state.

“I’ve suppressed so much,” Berthelsen said. “I had an IUD (intrauterine device) fitted nine times since the age of 13, according to my medical records,” the psychologist and activist explained with poise and dignity.

“Luckily — if one can say luckily — they fell out,” she said, her voice cracking, at her home in a Copenhagen suburb. “I remember being in so much pain.” 

Now 66, Berthelsen is one of the 143 Greenland Inuits who have sued the Danish state for violating their rights during its forced contraception campaign from the 1960s to 1980.

Some 4,500 fertile women were forced to undergo the procedure, often without their or their family’s consent.

Denmark carried out the campaign to limit the birth rate in the Arctic territory, which had not been its colony since 1953 but was still under its control.

Berthelsen’s parents never consented to her coils.

At the recommendation of the state, she was sent to Denmark for a year as a young girl to learn Danish and then to a Danish boarding school in Nuuk, Greenland’s capital, far from her hometown of Qeqertarsuatsiaat in southwestern Greenland.

One day, “there was a sign that said that all the girls from the boarding school had to go to the infirmary”, she said.

The IUDs kept falling out, she recalled, holding a photograph of herself from the time — a young girl with long dark plaits.

‘Never contradict a Dane’

For a long time she didn’t tell anyone about her ordeal, remembering what her mother had taught her: ‘Never contradict a Dane’.

For many of her classmates, the experience had a devastating impact.

“In my class there were several girls who were never able to have children,” she said.

Berthelsen herself went on to have two kids.

She is now campaigning to get the Danish state to pay for therapy for the victims living in Denmark.

Greenland already pays such benefits to those living in the territory.

Ebbe Volquardsen, a lecturer at the University of Nuuk, said the women were seeking justice now because the time was ripe.

“It simply takes time for marginalised groups, including Greenlanders within the Danish realm, to develop an awareness of systemic inequality and the ability to articulate it as a problem,” she explained.

One of the victims spoke out in the media several years ago about the trauma she experienced.

A podcast series by Danish public broadcaster DR in 2022 then revealed the extent of the campaign.

“It’s important that the Danish state takes responsibility,” said Berthelsen.

“Some things happened as a result of colonialism” — like “deciding, instead of the people (concerned), whether they are too many or too few, committing a genocide, committing violence and offences against young girls”, she fumed.

Historian Soren Rud told AFP: “In the context of the 2020s, the authoritarian elements of the campaign stood out as a shocking example of how the colonial and post-colonial situation affected the interaction between Greenlanders and Danes.”

‘Big success’

The lawyer for the plaintiffs, Mads Pramming, said one of the documents presented as evidence in the case is a copy of a 1971 review by a doctor extolling the “success” of the policy.

“There were 9,000 fertile women and, in just four years, they inserted an IUD in half of them. So 4,500. And the population dived enormously,” he said.

“Some towns had zero births during that period. After four years they concluded (it was a) big success.”

The large majority of the plaintiffs — the oldest of whom is now 82 — were left with lasting scars.

“Of the 143, about 50 of them had their uterus removed and were not able to have kids, and all of them suffered” physically and mentally, he said.

“Their own testimony is going to be the hardest evidence in the case.”

A fire destroyed many of the women’s medical files but that’s unlikely to change much.

“I don’t think the doctor would put in the medical file that he inserted this IUD in a 12-year-old girl with her crying and being held by two other adults,” Pramming said.

In October 2023, 67 of the plaintiffs filed claims for compensation from the Danish state of 300,000 kroner ($42,000) each.

“All of the requests for compensation will be evaluated by (us),” the health ministry told AFP in an email.

The case comes as Denmark and Greenland are re-examining their past relationship in a historic parliamentary committee.

In addition, researchers have opened a probe specifically into the forced contraception campaign.

Its conclusions are due in mid-2025.

SHOW COMMENTS