Radio România Internațional

Tag: herd

  • February 9, 2022

    February 9, 2022

    COVID-19 In
    Romania 27,346 new SARS-CoV-2 infections were reported on Wednesday, fewer than
    on the previous day, and 176 related deaths, 5 of them from a previous date.
    According to experts, who have identified the Omicron variant of the coronavirus
    in all sequenced samples, Romania may have achieved herd immunity and the fifth pandemic wave is quite likely to end in spring. The vaccination rate
    remains very low, and the number of fully vaccinated citizens is little over 8
    million.


    CONFERENCE The Romanian health minister Alexandru Rafila takes part today and
    tomorrow in a joint conference of EU foreign and health ministers on global
    health and in an informal meeting of EU health ministers, due in Lyon and Grenoble (France). The 2 events are organised by the French
    presidency of the EU Council. The participants will discuss the EU measures to
    support developing countries in accessing medicines in the context of the COVID-19
    pandemic, and to strengthen national healthcare systems. The informal meeting
    of health ministers will focus on the intervention and resilience of public
    health systems in case of crises, and on the joint development of policies to
    create a ‘Union of health.’


    MOTION The Chamber of Deputies in
    Bucharest Wednesday dismissed the simple motion tabled by the opposition party USR
    against the Liberal minister for energy Virgil Popescu, with 98 votes in favour
    and 190 against. According to the authors, Popescu is a threat to Romania’s
    energy security and must be dismissed immediately. The motion was scheduled for
    debates on Monday, but the meeting was suspended after the co-president of the
    nationalist party AUR, George Simion, assaulted the energy minister during his
    address. The meeting was subsequently resumed, but with only the opposition MPs from AUR and USR in attendance. Virgil
    Popescu and the MPs from the ruling coalition left the hall in protest. Prosecutors
    have opened a criminal case with respect to the incident.


    ECONOMY Romania’s trade balance deficit in 2021 amounted to EUR 23.69
    billion, over EUR 5.3 billion higher than in 2020, according to data released
    on Wednesday by the National Statistics Institute. Last year exports totalled
    EUR 74.7 billion and imports over EUR 98 billion.
    Official data also reveal that in 2021, vehicle and transport equipment
    accounted for 44.9% of Romania’s exports and 35.2% of imports, with other
    manufactured products also accounting for large shares of the country’s foreign
    trade.


    UKRAINE International diplomatic efforts continue with a view to deescalate
    the Russia-Ukraine standoff. The president of France Emmanuel Macron called for
    a dynamic dialogue with Russia, which he sees as the only way to make peace in
    Ukraine possible. Macron discussed with the Russian leader Vladimir Putin in
    Moscow and with his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelensky in Kyiv, and
    voiced confidence that progress will be made in the peace talks, but
    warned that risks still exist and that months of negotiations will be needed. In
    turn, president Volodymyr Zelensky said he was looking forward to resuming
    Normandy Format negotiations with Russia, brokered by France and Germany. He
    also insisted that president Putin complied with the Minsk agreements, whose
    main clause concerns the sovereignty of Ukraine. The Russian-Ukrainian tensions
    were also discussed on Tuesday in Berlin by the German chancellor Olaf Scholz with
    the presidents of France Emmanuel Macron and of Poland, Andrzej Duda. Germany,
    France and Poland are united in their goal of preserving peace in Europe,
    said the German chancellor, who is to travel to Moscow next week.


    TENNIS The Romanian player Sorana
    Cirstea today takes on seed no. 2 Anett Kontaveit of Estonia in the round of 16
    of the WTA 500 tournament in Sankt Petersburg (Russia). Two other Romanians, Irina
    Begu and Jaqueline Cristian will play tomorrow in the same round, against Petra
    Kvitova of the Czech Republic and Aleksandra Sasnovich of Belarus, respectively. (A.M.P.)

  • Four million Romanians vaccinated

    Four million Romanians vaccinated


    Romania has over 4 million citizens who have received at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccines approved and used in the EU: Pfizer/BioNTech, Moderna, AstraZeneca and Johnson&Johnson.




    The coordinator of the national vaccination campaign Valeriu Gheorghiţă said that in August according to experts the country will reach a “herd immunity threshold of 50% of the people either vaccinated or having recovered from the disease. He emphasized that authorities want to step up the vaccine rollout so as to reach the 5-million target by the end of May, 6 million in July and 7 million people vaccinated by late August.




    Valeriu Gheorghiţă added that although current infection figures are good, this positive trend must be consolidated if the country is to avoid a relapse after the gradual lifting of restrictions.




    As of late, Romania has stepped up its vaccine rollout, with people able to get a jab without needing a prior appointment and with new methods being introduced, such as vaccination marathons in major cities, drive-thru vaccination centres, mobile vaccination units travelling to large companies and vaccination caravans in remote, isolated areas. Immunization by family physicians has also grown substantially.




    The combined vaccination rate is now around 100,000 jabs per day, with any person able to get one in any centre, without prior appointment, based on ID alone. This simple and efficient method has attracted many of the Romanians living abroad, who travelled back to the country for this special purpose. We must bring the vaccine closer to people, president Klaus Iohannis said on Tuesday:




    Klaus Iohannis: “The successful vaccination of as many Romanians as possible is the prerequisite for fully reopening all social and economic sectors and for building post-pandemic Romania. Mayors and other local authorities, regardless of their political complexion, must be actively involved in the vaccination campaign. So far we have been successful mostly in urban communities. This is why it is important to step up the rollout in rural areas, because access to vaccines is more difficult there. People must be informed, in smaller localities local officials should even go from door to door to tell people how important it is to get the vaccine.




    The head of state warned that a prospective danger is that, as the disease is gradually contained, some people may think the worst is over and that there is no point in getting the vaccine. This is a misguided sense of security. Until a substantial number of us have got the vaccine, the pandemic is not over, and the risk for the unvaccinated to develop a severe form of the disease remains high, Klaus Iohannis warned. (tr. A.M. Popescu)