Slovakia will go under curfew again. Starting on Saturday, December 19 at 5:00, all shops except for essential ones (groceries, chemist's, pharmacies, etc.) will close, while people will be recommended to stay home.

There will be several exceptions. One basic condition is that people who want to spend Christmas with somebody else should choose only one different household and create some kind of "small bubble" to slow the spread of the virus.

"This is a ban that strongly calls for the responsibility of people," Health Minister Marek Krajčí (OĽaNO) said.

As there will be several exceptions from curfew, he called on people to follow basic rules and avoid meeting many people from different households.

"The situation is worse than ever, and the virus is spreading uncontrollably," Krajčí added.

The restrictions will currently be applied only until December 29, when the national emergency ends. However, it will be possible to prolong it until January 10, if the parliament passes a law that will enable it prolong the national emergency repeatedly (for now, it is possible to declare the emergency for 90 days only).

Exceptions

There will be several exceptions from the curfew:

• travelling to work (but employers will be recommended to allow for home office, if possible);
• going to essential shops, pharmacies, medical facilities, banks and insurance companies, car and bicycle repair shops, post office and the issue counters of shops and e-shops;
• walking pets;
• taking children to schools/kindergartens;
• going to a testing site;
• going to a funeral, wedding ceremony or christening;
• taking care of a relative;
• visits to nature;
• individual sports outdoor (such as skiing, cross-country skiing);
• going to churches;
• travelling to a recreation facility;
• visits between two households only.

Rules for travelling to and from Slovakia do not change.

COVID automat passed

The cabinet also gave a green light to the Health Ministry's plan of managing the measures. It is officially called the Alert system for the monitoring of the pandemic development and taking measures against SARS-CoV-2, to be known as the COVID automat.

The COVID automat, the official name of the automatic system for the adopting and lifting of measures, will provide information about the epidemic situation and the risk rate at the regional level. It should also provide for efficient and timely measures, transparent and predictable.

The COVID automat works with these key indicators:

• number of cases (future strain);
• increase in cases (current strain);
• the dynamics of the epidemic.

Individual departments will be able to apply their own systems of measures (e.g. the Education Ministry for schools), if they fulfil four key criteria as defined by the COVID automat:

• safety (to prevent the spread of infection in communities);
• isolation;
• protection;
• surveillance (management and monitoring of infections, testing, identification of positive cases and suspects).

A Flourish data visualization

The COVID automat will be switching between regional measures and nationwide measures based on the epidemic situation as defined by the key indicators. In higher level of alert, measures are taken for the whole country, with a lower level of alert regional measures applied.

The indicators to be followed are the seven-day average of new cases, number of hospitalisations, and the reproduction number.

First level of nationwide alert arises with more than 1,000 new cases in a seven-day average, the second level with 1,500-3,000, the third level 3,000-5,000, and fourth level at 5,000.

The number of hospitalisations will be 1,500 for the first level alert, 2,000-2,500 for the second level, and more than 2,500 for the higher levels.

When managed at the regional level, neighbouring regions shall not have more than three levels difference between them. The alert level for the better-off region is increasing in order to accommodate this condition.

Measures will be eased no earlier than ten days after the re-assessment of the regions.

Čítajte viac: https://spectator.sme.sk/c/22556791/christmas-in-small-bubbles-cabinet-introduces-rules-for-curfew.html  

Financial Times: On Brexit, the Tories have fallen prey to magical thinking

On Brexit, the Tories have fallen prey to magical thinking

Ministers still wish away hard trade-offs without a clear vision for prosperity if there is no deal

Jonathan McHugh illustration of Camilla Cavendish column 'On Brexit, the Tories have fallen prey to magical thinking'

© Jonathan McHugh 2020

   

December 11, 2020 4:00 pm by Camilla Cavendish

In the weeks following the Brexit referendum vote, I sat with two of the wisest heads in government — the late Lord Heywood and Sir Oliver Letwin — to parse the different courses the UK might take to exit the European Union. Experts came and went, and possible permutations were sketched: "Canada-plus", "Norway" and other regimes. It was obvious there would be a trade-off between sovereignty and market access. The only question was the balance the next prime minister would strike between the two. This in turn would partly be driven by his or her economic vision.

Four years later, the UK and EU stand on the cusp of a momentous event. Yet the UK is still trying to wish away the trade-offs, with no coherent vision for future prosperity. What many Leavers thought was going to be buccaneering Britain is turning out to be a Britain engorged with Covid-led state intervention, no serious prospectus for deregulation, and few radical policies to help enterprise either. 

For a long time, I assumed there must be a secret plan. By seeking a thin trade deal, ministers have already put up big trading barriers to our nearest and biggest market. It would be highly risky to do that without a cunning alternative to support jobs and livelihoods. European leaders have thought the same: the British state, with its high-handed attitude, must have something up its sleeve.

That is why, fearing unfair future competition, Brussels is insisting that any deal must guarantee a "level playing field" in areas like labour standards and restrictions on state aid.

The threat is surely exaggerated. Far from becoming a Singapore-on-Thames, the UK has been heading in the opposite direction. Boris Johnson has embraced a more social democratic model with big spending, social protections and environmentalism. There is little now that suggests a serious desire to depart from most EU standards. As a result, the EU and UK are locked in a row that may tip both sides into a damaging no deal, on a mistaken premise.

The full horror of this impasse now seems to be dawning on some Brexiters. Many ministers seem to be squinting at events, barely able to look and instead busying themselves with trivia. The culture secretary wants Netflix to warn viewers that the TV series The Crown is a fictional dramatisation. The education secretary claims Britain got a head start on vaccinating against Covid-19 because "we're a much better country". Jingoism and nostalgia often rise as empires crumble. 

Regardless of how anyone voted in 2016, we all want our country to prosper. But now we've reached the eleventh hour, I'd like someone to say what the plan is and to be reminded: why exactly are we doing this?

Ever since Theresa May declared in January 2017 that the UK could not "possibly" stay in the single market or a full customs union, most Tories have been unwilling to accept the implications. A few Leavers tried to develop a prospectus for how to forge a new path in the world — such as hedge fund manager Paul Marshall. But ministers didn't listen.

As a result, the UK is now underprepared for the situation it has triggered. If global Britain is to be a dynamic trading nation, for example, we will need excellent transport links and logistics. Yet Heathrow has been overtaken by Paris Charles de Gaulle as Europe's busiest airport, in part because ministers dithered for so long over passenger testing for Covid-19. And some UK ports are so congested and inefficient that shipping companies have imposed surcharges on exports to Britain.

Reducing red tape is another obvious area where Brexit could bring benefits. But many companies want to maintain equivalence to protect their supply chains. The UK also wants higher standards than Brussels on animal welfare. This doesn't feel like a free market drive for regulatory divergence. Meanwhile, at least over the short term, Brexit is leading to reams of increased paperwork.

One good idea is to create an Office of Regulatory Assessment to illuminate the cost of regulatory burdens on businesses and to help boost economic growth, as similar reforms did in Canada 20 years ago. Yet no such body exists, despite the apparent belief of Mr Johnson's former adviser Dominic Cummings in deregulation. The proposal instead comes from the Campaign for Economic Growth, a new ginger group, which is alarmed by the lack of progress.

Perhaps the pandemic has derailed this kind of detailed thinking. But even before Covid-19 struck there was no strategy to achieve the campaign promise that Brexit would "see a pent-up tidal wave of investment into our country". The 2019 Conservative manifesto contained this statement but didn't say how. Beyond a few paragraphs about technology and R&D, it said little about business. At the subsequent election, Mr Johnson forged a coalition which has only accentuated the government's desire to spend, raise the minimum wage and "level up" the north. There is no concomitant desire to protect the service industry in the south, or plan to generate the needed revenues.

Of all the brilliant minds I met in Whitehall's echoing corridors in June 2016, none foresaw how much the Conservative party would fall prey to magical thinking. However damaging a "no deal" will be, one Tory moderate told me this week that it might be the only way to force the government to get its act together, accept the trade-offs it has so far wished away, and start to think seriously about how Britain can prosper alone. Deal or no deal, that work starts now.

The writer, a former head of the Downing Street policy unit, is a Harvard senior fellow

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