12h11 – Graça Freitas recovered from Covid-19
The Director-General of Health is recovered and returns to work on Monday. In an interview with the weekly Sol, Graça Freitas says she feels relief and is grateful for life.
The official passed through Covid-19 without serious problems. She confesses that she felt anxious and that she is relieved not to have infected anyone.
12:05 pm – Macron state is “stable” and tests are “reassuring”
The French President, diagnosed with Covid-19, has a “stable” health condition and the results of the clinical tests he has undergone in the last hours “prove to be reassuring”, advances in release the Elisha.
Emmanuel Macron is in isolation at the official residence of La Lanterne in Versailles.
“He continues to show the same symptoms of Covid-19 disease (fatigue, cough, stiffness) that do not prevent him from fulfilling his duties at all,” adds the same note, signed by the chief physician of the Presidency, Jean-Christophe Perrochon .
11h43 – Support Restoration covers new year night
The Government points out that the measure called Support Restoration includes the losses of restaurants in mainland Portugal on 31 December. It aims to compensate for the drop in billing resulting from operating restrictions announced on Thursday.
Remember that restaurants can only operate until 10:30 pm on the last day of the year and until 1:00 pm on January 1, 2 and 3.
“Restaurants will thus be able to compensate 20 percent of their revenue breakdown, compared to the average of the first weekends of the year 2020, being open to micro, small and medium-sized companies in the catering sector and the like”, says the office Minister of State, Economy and Digital Transition, in a note sent to newsrooms.
O Support Restoration, in force since November 25, applies to weekends, holidays and the eve of holidays in which the suspension of activities is in force and is “cumulative with the Apoiar.pt measure”.
11h00 – Most affected are the most vulnerable in society
The people most affected by the new coronavirus pandemic “are also the most vulnerable from the point of view of social inequalities”, summarized in the book A Sociological Look at the Covid-19 Crisis.
The work is presented next week, in a virtual session with a commentary by economist Susana Peralta, and later at the congress of the Portuguese Association of Sociology.
Including 16 texts, the book was organized by Renato Miguel do Carmo, Inês Tavares and Ana Filipa Cândido, within the framework of the Observatory of Inequalities at the Center for Research and Studies in Sociology, at Iscte – Instituto Universitário de Lisboa.
10h14 – Vaccinated House of Representatives and Senate leaders
A speaker of the United States House of Representatives and the Senate Republican majority leader were vaccinated on Friday against Covid-19.
Nancy Pelosi and Mitch McConnell were the first members of the Capitol to receive the immunization.
There is a presidential directive so that all members of Congress, the Supreme Federal Court and agencies with executive powers have priority in vaccination, in order to maintain the country’s governance capacity.
10h09 – Russia over 2.8 million infected and 50 thousand deaths
Russia this Saturday surpassed the 2.8 million new cases of Covid-19, adding 28,209 new infections, and 50,000 deaths, according to the operational center of the fight against the new coronavirus.
Since the beginning of the pandemic, in the 85 regions of Russia, 2,819,429 cases of infection have been reported. In the same period, 2,254,742 people recovered from the disease.
9:41 am – WHO calls for responses to refugees
The World Health Organization asks countries to include refugees in response plans to Covid-19.
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The director-general recalls that these people are less likely to seek care if they experience symptoms of the disease.
9:10 am – Germany updates numbers
The number of confirmed cases of infection with the new coronavirus in Germany has increased, in the last 24 hours, by 31,300, to a total of 1,471,238 since the beginning of the pandemic.
The latest data from the Robert Koch Institute for Infectious Diseases still report 702 deaths, for a total of 25,640.
8:32 am – India exceeds ten million infections
India has exceeded the 10 million cases of Covid-19 in the last 24 hours, registering more than 25,000 new contagions, said the Indian Ministry of Health.
According to Indian health authorities, 347 deaths and 25,152 cases of Covid-19 were reported within 24 hours.
India is the second country in the world with the highest number of infections, behind the United States.
8:14 am – Moderna vaccine authorized in the United States
The agency that regulates the drug and food market in the United States gave the green light to the use of the vaccine against Covid-19 by the American biotechnology company Moderna.
The authorization comes a week after the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) decided in favor of the pharmaceutical company Pfizer, whose first doses are already being administered in the United States.
“With two vaccines available for the prevention of Covid-19, the FDA has taken another crucial step in the fight against this pandemic that is causing a high daily number of hospitalizations and deaths in the United States,” said the agency’s director, Stephen Hahn.
7:28 am – State of play
The prime minister will remain in prophylactic isolation until 29 December.
The health authorities considered António Costa as contact with high-risk exposure to Covid-19, after the meeting he had with the French President, Emanuel Macron, last Wednesday, at the Elysee Palace, in Paris.
Macron tested positive for Covid-19 the day after that meeting.
António Costa is thus confined to the official residence until the end of the period of active surveillance. The governor has been preventively at the São Bento Palace since last Thursday.
Mandatory curfew starting at 1 pm in 113 municipalities
One hundred and thirteen municipalities considered to be at very high or extreme risk of transmitting SARS-CoV-2 are this weekend under curfew starting at 1 pm. Commerce and restaurants must close their doors at the same time.
This is the sixth consecutive weekend of application of this measure.
Although the list of risk levels was updated on Thursday, the restrictions remain unchanged until the new state of emergency enters into force on Christmas Eve.
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Thus, the counties that have a curfew this weekend at 1:00 pm are the same ones in which this restriction was applied last weekend.
Exceptions to the mandatory closing at 1 pm are retail establishments selling food products, as well as natural or dietary, health and hygiene establishments with a sales or service area equal to or less than 200 square meters, with entrance autonomous and independent from the public road.
The lists can be consulted on here.
Vaccines
Portugal is expected to receive 1.2 million vaccines against Covid-19 in the first quarter of next year.
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The data were revealed yesterday by the Minister of Health, Marta Temido, in a parliamentary hearing on the vaccination plan.
The picture in Portugal
The latest epidemiological bulletin from the Directorate-General for Health, released early Friday afternoon, reported 75 more deaths associated with Covid-19 and 4336 new confirmed cases of infection.
3061 people were hospitalized, 81 fewer than on Thursday, of whom 484 were in intensive care units, 10 less compared to the previous day.
Since the beginning of the pandemic, Portugal has registered 5977 deaths and 366,952 cases of infection by SARS-CoV-2. 70,285 cases were active yesterday, an increase of 599 compared to Thursday.
3662 cases were recovered. Since the beginning of the epidemic in Portugal in March, 290,690 people have recovered.
The largest number of deaths continues to be concentrated in people over 80, followed by patients between 70 and 79 years old.
The international framework
The Covid-19 pandemic caused at least 1,662,792 deaths resulting from more than 74.8 million cases of infection, according to the balance sheet which is constantly being updated by the agency France Presse.
Switzerland removed Portugal from the list of countries at risk for Covid-19 infection.
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The Portuguese living in Switzerland made a petition asking for Portugal to be removed from the red list and the Portuguese Government itself considered that there was no reason to keep the country on the list, given that it has fewer cases of Covid-19 infection.
The presence on the list obliged emigrants to come to Portugal at Christmas for a period of quarantine when they returned to Switzerland.
Portugal is out of this risk list until at least December 27th and the emigrants’ travel can thus proceed without any restrictions.
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