MAccording to the Robert Koch Institute (RKI), several key figures for the corona pandemic from last week suggest a downward trend. The seven-day incidence, for example, fell in all federal states, the decrease is 35 percent in a weekly comparison, as can be seen from the institute’s Covid 19 weekly report on Thursday evening. “The factor of the school holidays, which influences both contact and test behavior, must still be considered here,” it says.
The report largely refers to the past week, when most of the federal states had a public holiday on Monday or Tuesday.
The RKI also sees a further decline in serious illnesses. As in the previous weeks, there are now warnings of high infection pressure in autumn – not only with regard to Covid-19, but also because of other respiratory diseases. The flu and RSV waves have already started. RSV stands for Respiratory Syncytial Virus.
Sanofi vaccine released
The EU medicines agency EMA gave the green light on Thursday for the approval of a corona booster vaccine from the French pharmaceutical company Sanofi. The vaccine developed jointly by Sanofi and the British company GlaxoSmithKline is suitable as a booster vaccine for adults after previous vaccination with the preparations from Biontech/Pfizer, Moderna and those from Astrazeneca and Johnson&Johnson, the EMA said on Thursday.
Studies have shown that the booster vaccine is effective against the omicron variant of the coronavirus, the agency said. Sanofi and GSK had developed the “new generation” vaccine at the same time as their basic vaccine, which is still pending approval.
Falsifying vaccination records is a criminal offence
The 5th Criminal Senate of the Federal Court of Justice (BGH) meanwhile lifted an acquittal in Leipzig in connection with falsification of corona vaccination certificates. In the specific case, there is a criminal offense for falsifying health certificates, the BGH announced on Thursday in Karlsruhe.
For a year now, using a fake vaccination card in a pharmacy, for example, has been punishable by a fine or up to two years in prison. Commercial trading in such papers can result in imprisonment of up to five years.
In Hamburg, a defendant was acquitted of the charge of falsifying health certificates, although he had issued a total of 19 false corona proofs in vaccination cards with batch number, stamp and signature of an alleged vaccinator for money. He was also not convicted of forgery. The public prosecutor’s office appealed against this and was now successful.
