October 17, 2021

A roundup of local and international news.

Newsroom, 17.10.2021, 14:00

Covid-19. Romania reported on Sunday over
11,500 new Covid infections in 41,000 people tested and 298 related fatalities,
while 1,750 Covid patients are in intensive care. The Covid incidence rate for
the last fortnight in Bucharest is 16 cases per 1,000 inhabitants, from under 2
per 1,000 a month ago. As far as the vaccination rate is concerned, almost 6
million people in Romania have had at least one dose, with almost 60,000 people
getting their jab in the last 24 hours. In another move, Romania’s
representative at the World Health Organisation Alexandru
Rafila said the organisation’s experts requested a meeting with the National
Public Health Institute to look into the causes of the epidemiological disaster
in Romania, as well as to provide help with the vaccination campaign and assess
the needs of the country’s hospitals.

Aid. International aid continues to
arrive in Romania to help with the management of the health crisis after the
Romanian state requested European support to combat the consequences of an
exponential rise in new Covid cases. 15 ventilators and 8 oxygen concentrators
used in the treatment of Covid patients arrived on Saturday from Denmark.
Hospitals in Szeged and Debrecen, in Hungary, are treating 20 Romanian
patients, and others are about to be transferred to other hospitals in Hungary.
A group of doctors and nurses from the neighbouring Republic of Moldova will
arrive on Monday at the mobile unit in Leţcani, near Iaşi, in north-eastern
Romania. Under the EU civil protection mechanism, The Netherlands has already
delivered 200 oxygen concentrators and Poland 50, and Italy has sent 5,200
vials of monoclonal antibodies which are part of the standard treatment of
Covid patients.

List. An updated list of countries
with high epidemiological risk came into force in Romania today. Ukraine and
Gibraltar are now on the red list, following an increase in cases, while
Albania and the Virgin Islands of the United States, which saw a drop in cases,
were moved to the yellow list. The Netherlands, Gabon, Montserrat and the
British Virgin Islands, where cases have risen, are now also on the yellow
list. Switzerland, Canada, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Andorra and Greenland are on the
green list. Travellers from yellow and red list countries who are fully
vaccinated against Covid-19 are not required to isolate on entering Romania.

Politics. Prime minister designate
Dacian Cioloş is planning
to submit in Parliament the list of a minority Save Romania Union cabinet after
he failed to rebuild the coalition with the National Liberal Party and the
Democratic Union of Ethnic Hungarians in Romania. The party’s political bureau
is meeting today to analyse and approve the governing programme and the cabinet
membership. Although Cioloş was willing to negotiate with the Liberals,
Friday’s meeting was cancelled after the Liberal leader, outgoing prime
minister Florin Cîţu, said Cioloş should form a government with the Social
Democratic Party and the Alliance for the Union of Romanians, alongside which
the Save Romania Union voted to bring down the government. The same message
came from the leader of the Democratic Union of Ethnic Hungarians in Romania,
Kelemen Hunor, who said the prime minister designate did not manage to restore
a minimum level of trust that would have allowed the recreation of the
coalition. Dacian Cioloş ruled out any talks with the Social Democrats and
called for responsibility. (CM)