From nursing homes in France to hospitals in Poland, older Europeans and the workers who care for them rolled up their sleeves on Sunday to receive coronavirus vaccine shots in a campaign to inoculate more than 450 million people across the European Union.

The inoculations offered a rare respite as the continent struggles with one of its most precarious moments since the pandemic began.

Despite national lockdowns, restrictions on movement, shuttering of restaurants and cancellations of Christmas gatherings, the virus has stalked Europe into the dark winter months. The spread of a more contagious variant of the virus in Britain has raised such alarm that much of continental Europe rushed to close its borders to travelers coming from the country, effectively plunging the nation as a whole into quarantine.

“Today, we start turning the page on a difficult year,” Ursula von der Leyen, the European Commission president wrote on Twitter. “The #COVID19 vaccine has been delivered to all EU countries.”

For Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte of Italy, the vaccine’s arrival could not come soon enough. Italy’s suffering at the outset of the pandemic served as a warning for the world, and the current death toll is again among the worst in Europe.

“Today Italy reawakens. It’s #VaccineDay,” he wrote on Twitter after a 29-year-old nurse at Rome’s Spallanzani hospital was the first person to be inoculated. “This date will remain with us forever.”

The nurse, Claudia Alivernini, said she hoped the vaccination campaign would signal “the beginning of the end” of the pandemic.

In Spain, a 96-year-old great-grandmother, Araceli Rosario Hidalgo, was the first to receive the vaccine. The Los Olmos nursing home, where she lives, is in Guadalajara,  a city that has a special storage facility where the first doses of the vaccine were delivered on Saturday, transported from Belgium.

Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez wrote on Twitter that the  vaccinations marked “a hopeful new chapter.”

Similar scenes played out across the continent, although not every member of the bloc followed the rollout plans. In Germany, a nursing home in the eastern state of Saxony-Anhalt jumped the gun, inoculating dozens of residents and staff members on Saturday, hours after the doses arrived. Officials in the Netherlands said they planned to begin vaccinations on Jan. 8.

But all E.U. member nations now have a supply of vaccine on hand to distribute.

https://www.nytimes.com/live/2020/12/27/world/covid-19-coronavirus-updates

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There are currently many more corona patients in intensive care than in March and April, at the start of the corona pandemic in the Netherlands. This confirms Diederik Gommers, chairman of the Dutch Association for Intensive Care (NVIC), following reports in the AD .

This is because the length of stay of corona patients in the ICU has become much shorter. In March and April, a patient spent an average of 22 days in the ICU, in July and August this had dropped to less than eight, according to figures from the National Intensive Care Evaluation Foundation (NICE).

It should be noted that the figures for July and August may be slightly higher, because a number of those patients were still in the ICU when the report was written.

"We are still investigating why people can leave the IC faster," says Gommers. "But if you assume that it concerns a comparable group of patients, then I think an important part can be attributed to the improved treatment."

The corona patients not only leave the IC faster, the chance of survival has also improved, says Gommers. He says there are no indications that the virus has become milder.

"We still need to do more research into the causes, but it is certainly a very promising development," he says. "We don't know if there will be a second corona wave and how big it will be, but if it is comparable to the first, then we need to expand the ICs much less."

https://nos.nl/artikel/2348331-gommers-coronapatienten-nu-veel-korter-op-ic.html

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The most ill covid-19 patients benefit from treatment with corticosteroids, possibly in combination with an agent that slows down the functioning of the immune system. This experimental treatment reduces mortality in this patient group by as much as 65 percent.

These are patients who are affected by a so-called cytokine storm, an overreaction of the immune system that causes inflammation in the body. Cytokine Storm Syndrome (CSS) occurs in more infectious diseases and in about a quarter of all covid-19 patients who end up in the hospital.

Researchers from the Zuyderland Medical Center in Geleen and Heerlen are publishing their findings today in The Annals of Rheumatic Diseases . The Zuyderland received many corona patients. Mortality among the sickest patients in the hospital was about 48 percent in March. The doctors at the hospital then started their experimental treatment, which caused the mortality to drop to 16 percent.

https://nos.nl/artikel/2341379-drastische-verbetering-ziekste-covid-19-patienten-door-experimentele-behandeling.html

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Sjaak de Gouw, director of public health in the Netherlands, says that Covid-19 is milder than previously thought. Many Dutch people have had the new coronavirus without having any complaints.

Previously, according to De Gouw, researchers thought that 20 percent of people infected with Covid-19 ended up in hospital. This now appears to be 3.5 percent of corona patients.

"If we look at the number of people we tested, who found positive and were hospitalized, it appears that many people had no or mild complaints. They were out of the picture," says De Gouw.

https://www.nieuws365.be/news/18388/opvallende-conclusie-het-coronavirus-is-minder-erg-dan-gedacht

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The number of people in the Netherlands known to have died from respiratory illness Covid-19 herald at 6,105, public health agency RIVM said on Sunday. It was the second time in a week that the death toll did not rise as a result of the coronavirus disease.

Nobody in the country is known to have died from the disease since June 24, and there were also no deaths linked to Covid-19 on June 22. Prior to that, the last time there had been a date without a Covid-19 fatality was on March 9.

The agency constantly updates its statistics as new data becomes available, which could mean that a fatal case is linked to a date in which previously there had been none. The same holds true for new hospitalizations, with 11,871 people having been admitted to hospital for the disease since late February.

That reflects an increase of three, the RIVM said. At least two of those admissions took place in the past week, a figure which could rise when more data is processed by the agency.

https://nltimes.nl/2020/06/28/netherlands-new-covid-19-deaths-since-june-24

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For the first time since mid-March, the number of Covid-19 patients in intensive care was below 200. There was a 16 percent decrease in patients from Monday afternoon, dropping to a total of 188 people on Tuesday, according to patient coordination office LCPS.

Figures from non-profit intensive care organization NICE also showed that no ICU patients with the coronavirus disease died in that same 24 hour period.

“As expected, the decrease in the number of COVID patients in the ICU is continuing. This is favorable for resuming other care,” said Ernst Kuipers, the head of the acute care providers network in the Netherlands. He reaffirmed his belief that in a matter of days, the country would have fewer than 150 Covid-19 patients in ICU.

Aside from 35 fewer people in ICU, there was also a large decrease of Covid-19 patients from other hospital wards. Dutch hospitals were treating 698 people for the disease on Tuesday, down 58 from one day prior, the LCPS said.

https://nltimes.nl/2020/05/26/covid-19-patients-icu-200-first-time-10-weeks

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The number of reports of people who died of the coronavirus is remarkably low today, with ten. Fifteen new hospital admissions have also been reported. However, the fact that the number of reports of deaths is so low today does not mean that the virus has disappeared, warns Marion Koopmans, professor by special appointment of virology at Erasmus MC in Rotterdam. “The numbers are always lower on weekends. We really have to wait on Monday to get a clearer picture. The falling numbers do fit the trend, but we certainly cannot say on the basis of today's figures that this is a break in the trend. Therefore, people should not think that it is over. The peak has passed, but there are still many people on the IC. The virus is certainly not gone and can also flare up. ”

According to Koopmans, it is also awaiting the consequences if the measures are further relaxed. ,, More things will open again and it will get busier on the street. It has gone well so far. But are we all going to keep our attention? That will be an exciting period. ”

Koopmans has not yet heard whether opening the schools has had an effect. “In Denmark this had hardly any effect. It's been a week here now, so it's too early to say anything. Teachers now also have more options to be tested, so it remains to be seen what we will see in the registrations. ”

https://www.ad.nl/dossier-coronavirus/10-nieuwe-doden-coronavirus-laagste-aantal-in-twee-maanden~ab310286/

Missing restaurants while social distancing? You're not alone. One restaurant in the Netherlands, though, has found a solution.

Mediamatic ETEN, a restaurant in Amsterdam, is offering a four-course vegetarian menu for diners -- served to guests while they sit in their own personal quarantine greenhouses.

Still, as many places begin to loosen restrictions on social distancing, this type of greenhouse dining could take off.

"It's super cozy, it's really cozy, it's nice and the food is delicious," diner Janita Vermeulen told Reuters.

Waiters wear gloves and face shields to alleviate any risk of infections, the restaurant confirmed. They also use long boards to bring dishes into the greenhouses to diners.

https://edition.cnn.com/2020/05/07/world/dutch-restaurant-reopen-greenhouse-trnd/index.html

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The "first outbreak phase" of the coronavirus is behind us, Prime Minister Mark Rutte said last night. "We are now entering the phase where we have to make the transition to the 1.5 meter society."

The plan is now to get almost all contact professions back to work from 11 May . Hairdressers, foot care workers, masseurs do have to work by appointment. 1.5 meters should be kept between the customers . Driving schools are also allowed to return to work. The CBR also resumes the  exams .

For outdoor sports , they can also get back to work with that reservation, including people over 18 years old. This mainly concerns non-contact sports , such as tennis and golf.

The motto 'stay at home as much as possible' also changes on May 11 to: 'stay at home if you have health problems' . The advice remains to keep 1.5 meters apart.

From 1 June, terraces may open again, just like beach bars. Also restaurants can again receive guests, but only by reservation. The maximum number of guests is then thirty. Also cinemas, concert halls, museums  and theaters open again, they must also take the maximum number of visitors in thirty eight. For families, however, they do not have to keep a distance of 1.5 meters when they go to the cinema or eat out. It is being investigated whether this can also apply to music venues. 

https://www.ad.nl/dossier-coronavirus/kabinet-versoepelt-reeks-coronamaatregelen-nederland-in-nieuwe-fase~abfa08ee/

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Several European countries are to relax coronavirus restrictions related to children, with Holland and France announcing that primary schools will reopen next month and Spain setting out how under-14s will be allowed out of the home from next week.

French children would return to school in staggered year groups, the education minister, Jean-Michel Blanquer said, with no more than 15 pupils allowed in each class.

Primary pupils aged from five to 11 would be the first to go back on 12 May, one day after the end of a strict nationwide lockdown. The following week older children in selected years at secondary schools and lycée would return. All classes would be back by 25 May.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/21/lockdown-eased-netherlands-and-france-plan-to-re-open-primary-schools